Uruguay's 32-31 victory in the second leg of their play-off against Canada earned the South Americans a 70-60 aggregate win that booked them a fourth Rugby World Cup appearance next year in Japan.

Los Teros will now join Australia, Wales, Georgia and Fiji in Pool D, following qualification in 1999, 2003 and 2015, while Canada must now win the four-team global repechage tournament in November to preserve their ever-present record.

Uruguay led the tie 38-29 after the first leg in Vancouver and went into the second encounter as firm favourites, but a much-improved effort from Canada had them worried until Andres Vilaseca crossed for the second time late on.

Canada got off to a flying start and within 12 minutes had all but wiped out the nine-point deficit, a penalty from Brock Staller and a try from DTH van der Merwe putting them 8-0 up.

Winger Taylor Paris dotted down at the back of a maul and Staller, who’d struck the upright with his first conversion, successfully added the extras to extend Canada's lead to 15-0 but Uruguay finally responded in the 34th-minute through second-row Ignacio Dotti.

Fly-half Felipe Berchesi converted and added a penalty but Staller replied in kind to make it 18-10 at half-time.

But Los Teros started the second period strongly and scored within two minutes of the restart through outside-centre Juan Manuel Cat, with fellow centre Vilasec capitalising on two Canadian handling errors, either side of a mauled try from replacement front-row Djustice Sears-Duru, to break away and make the game safe.

Even so, there was still time for one last act of defiance from Canada when van der Merwe, who gave it his all throughout the 80 minutes, extended his national try-scoring record to 31 with the last act of the game.

World Rugby chairman Bill Beaumont said: ““These America 2 qualifiers were hugely exciting and demonstrate the growing strength of rugby in the Americas. While Canada will be disappointed, they will now concentrate on their Americas Rugby Championship campaign and bouncing back stronger for the repechage in November.”