Chile vs Cuba

Estadio Ester Roa is the venue as Chile and Cuba lock horns in an exciting international friendly.

Chile’s preparation for the 2024 Copa America is off and running following a second consecutive busted attempt to qualify for the World Cup finals. After an awful nine-match form to complete the last calendar year (D3, L6), ‘La Roja’ kicked things off in 2023 with a bang, turning a 2-1 halftime deficit into a 3-2 victory over fellow CONMEBOL rivals Paraguay in March. Still, you’d need to go back to October/November 2021 for the last time Chile had won back-to-back internationals, suggesting a triumph over sub-par Cuba is not a foregone conclusion. If nothing, new manager Eduardo Berizzo has sparked Chile’s attacking set-up into life, with his men netting 2+ goals twice in their last four outings following six scoring blanks beforehand.

In the meantime, Cuba’s penultimate warm-up contest ahead of their upcoming CONCACAF Gold Cup appearance comes in the midst of a purple patch, with ‘Los Leones del Caribe’ racking u six wins in their last seven internationals (D1). But even though those results came against the nations ranked far worse than Chile in FIFA’s men’s rankings, the fact four yielded multi-goal margins might instill enough confidence in Pablo Elier Sanchez’s ranks. Cuba’s only previous international encounter against Chile was a 2-0 defeat in 2007, while their most recent meeting with a nation ranked inside FIFA’s top 100 saw the United States humble them 4-0 in November 2019. But a decent return of two clean sheets from their last four international travels (W3, D1) could inspire some confidence in the Cuba camp.