Uruguay and Manchester United’s Facundo Pellistri were eliminated from the Copa America tournament despite having a man advantage for half of the match.

The Uruguayans had narrowly defeated Brazil in the previous round, but Colombia’s 1-0 victory guaranteed them a spot in the final versus United’s Lisandro Martinez and Alejandro Garnacho’s Argentina.

The 15-time tournament winners trailed in the 39th minute when Jefferson Lerma nodded in from a corner after squandering a few obvious first-half opportunities. When Daniel Muñoz was shown a second yellow card in extra time of the first half, Uruguay’s opponents were reduced to ten men and had a big advantage.

La Celeste had 62% of the ball, but they were unable to capitalise on their good fortune and failed to score an equalising goal.

Despite playing the entire second half with an extra man, they could only generate two shots on target out of the 11 shots on goal they managed, which was equal to Colombia’s total.

Pellistri was substituted after the halftime break due to his extremely subpar performance.

The winger has faltered as the campaign has gone on, after having a goal and an assist to start the season off brightly.

The winger’s performance in Charlotte that evening earned him a 6.7 on Sofascore.

He had a pitiful 11 touches of the ball throughout the game and only succeeded on one dribbling attempt.

The winger’s ancillary impact on the game was evident as he only completed three of his four passes, despite having a 75% pass completion rate.

Even so, one of those passes was crucial, even though it did not result in a reward for his country. In the semifinal, he was similarly unable to get any kind of shot on or off target.

On defence, he was victorious in two of his four ground fights but lost the one he fought in the air. During the game, the attacker also completed one tackle.

Pellistri’s side will now compete in the third place playoff against Canada on Saturday night (Sunday morning UK time) where they will aim to put the disappointment of last night’s showing behind them.

United fans will also hope that a move for Uruguay’s Manuel Ugarte can speed up now that the South Americans can no longer win the tournament, in the same way the Netherlands’ Euro 2024 loss to England should help the Joshua Zirkzee and Matthijs de Ligt deals reach a swifter conclusion.