Jefferson Lerma was back in the Colombia starting XI on Tuesday evening as they recorded a dominant 4-0 win over Chile in Barranquilla.
The midfielder drew plaudits in the press for his dominant display in the crushing victory, with Colombia enjoying 63% possession and restricting their opponents to just two shots on target the whole evening.
A response was important as, the previous week, Colombia lost their unbeaten start to South American qualifying.
On a run of eight qualifiers unbeaten at that stage, Los Cafeteros will have been confident of extending that record when Bolivia went down to 10 men after 20 minutes in El Alto after Hector Cuellar saw red.
But Colombia surprisingly fell behind just before the hour mark and, despite Lerma being introduced from the bench three minutes later, were unable to overcome a stout Bolivian defence in the time that followed.
At the halfway mark in qualification, Colombia sit second in the South American table, with 19 points from 10 matches – three behind leaders Argentina. They currently lie seven points within the automatic qualification zone.
Palace teammate Daniel Muñoz withdrew from the Colombia squad at the start of the break through injury.
