Colombia’s legendary playmaker, Carlos Valderrama, has publicly praised the performance of David Ospina as he played an instrumental part in ensuring they were not comprehensively beaten by South American rivals Brazil this past week.

Valderrama was quoted as saying the following: “We played badly and I must say, we started [the match] asleep.

“Thank God we have a goalkeeper category which gives confidence, or it would’ve been a thrashing.”

Ospina, 28, has endured a mixed time with Arsenal since his arrival in the summer of 2014.

Since the arrival of Petr Čech though, he’s had to remain patient for first-team opportunities and is mainly only utilised in the domestic cup competitions – with many suggesting he should venture elsewhere in search of regular first-team football.

Ospina was heavily linked with a switch to Turkish side Besiktas this summer, but remained with us and continues to relish international competition with his compatriots.

Although his positioning for Miranda’s headed finish just minutes after kick-off was questionable to say the least, he made up for it with a succession of important saves to deny the Brazilian forwards an opportunity to make the scoreline embarrassing and improve their goal difference in the World Cup qualification group.

Brazil have leapfrogged a number of their South American rivals into second place with 15 points as it stands as a result of their 2-1 victory, courtesy of Neymar’s second-half winner.

Colombia meanwhile currently occupy the final automatic qualification spot in fourth with 13 points.