Paraguay 3, Ecuador 1

Not our best outing.

Fortunately, the Chileans failed to defeat Brazil (they came up five goals short), and Uruguay defeated Peru (somewhat controversially). These results guaranteed our qualification for this year’s World Cup, with a game to spare.

Uruguay qualified, too.

The really shocking result was in Europe: North Macedonia eliminated Italy, the continental champions.

As of this writing, we are the qualified nation with the second-least World Cup experience. This will be our fourth World Cup. For Qatar, the host nation, it will be the first.

Thirteen of thirty-two places remain unclaimed.