Ten-man Canada fail to clinch World Cup spot with loss to Costa Rica

:Battling Costa Rica edged 10-man Canada 1-0 on Thursday to deny the North Americans their first chance to clinch a spot in the 2022 World Cup finals.

Canada arrived in San Jose unbeaten in the final round of CONCACAF qualifying and looking to secure a berth in their first World Cup finals since 1986.

In little more than a half hour, though, they found themselves down 10 men and things went from bad to worse when Celso Borges netted a first half stoppage-time header that proved the only goal of the game.

Despite the loss, Canada sit top of the group standings on 25 points, three points clear of Mexico and the United States who battled to 0-0 draw at Azteca Stadium. With the win, Costa Rica moved into fourth on 19 points, still in the hunt for automatic qualification.

The top three automatically earn spots in November's World Cup in Qatar with the fourth-place finisher facing an Oceania team in an intercontinental playoff for another berth.

Canada's next chance to end their 36-year World Cup finals wait comes when they host Jamaica on Sunday in Toronto, before wrapping up qualifying on Wednesday away to Panama.

"This is football, we win 17 games where we've had the football gods with us," said Canada coach John Herdman. "They weren't with us tonight.

"But that's made us hungry to come back home and take what we need to take.

"We'll get back to Canada, we'll regroup and with this talent and passion and desire after this match we'll be ready."

Despite their group rivals gaining ground, Herdman was confident Canada would advance.

"We're not looking over our shouder, destiny is in our hands," he added.

"We'll get to Qatar."

They'll hope for a better start than in San Jose, where they were reduced to 10 men in the 34th minute when