In Brief
- The Blue Sharks made a stunning World Cup debut, advancing to the Group of 32.
- Some players leave the tournament with no formal club to play with.
Nobody expected Cape Verde would make it out of the group stage of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. But the team, ranked 67th in the world in men's football, quickly proved that passion can overcome the odds.
The small set of islands off the coast of West Africa has a population of only half a million, and had resorted to using LinkedIn in order to recruit players from the diaspora community.
Yet in the group stage, the 'Blue Sharks' held their own against Spain, Uruguay and Saudi Arabia. On Saturday, defending champions Argentina put an end to Cape Verde's unlikely tilt at the Cup in the round of 32.
Cape Verde's World Cup journey has shot the team into stardom, and highlighted a diaspora community whose population is often bigger than Cape Verde's island residents.
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So where do the players come from, and where will the players go from here?
The breakout star with no team
Like many Cape Verde residents, goalkeeper Josimar José Évora Dias, better known as Vozinha, left the country to pursue his career, playing professional football for Angola and Portugal among others.
The national team's 14-year veteran has been the breakout star for the squad, stopping Spain in their tracks with seven saves in Cape Verde's World Cup debut.
Vozinha now boasts millions of followers on social media, but the 40-year-old has no club to go back to.
His contract with second-division Portuguese club, Chaves, ended in 2026.
"I ended my contract with my previous club, Deportivo Chaves, and at the moment I still don't have anything," Vozinha told a Brazilian journalist.
"I'm open to everything. Let's see what comes up."
A shot at the Champions League
Roberto 'Pico' Lopes was playing as centre-back for Dublin's Shamrock Rovers when he received a message on LinkedIn from the Cape Verdean football association.
The Ireland-born player is Cape Verdean on his father's side. He told Reuters that he initially ignored the message as spam because it was written in Portuguese.
"Nine months later they messaged me back in English asking if I had thought about the proposal, and it was only then that I did what I should have done originally and Google-translated the original message asking if I would be interested in declaring for Cape Verde," he said.
A few years earlier, Lopes had been working in a bank while playing part-time football for Irish club Bohemians.
Now, the Shamrock Rovers have a shot at qualifying for the UEFA Champions League, and it's expected the 34-year-old will head straight back into the action for Wednesday's match against Malta.
'Bin bag as curtains'
Striker Sidny Lopes Cabral scored the goal of his career to equalise with Argentina in extra time.
Born in the Netherlands, Cabral spent his youth bouncing around teams in Europe, playing in Sweden and Germany before picking up a contract with Portuguese giant Benfica.
Cabral says his early years in Sweden were tough.
"I called my brother almost every day saying I didn't like it. The first day it was winter, raining, and I had to train in shorts and a T-shirt. I was so cold," he told The Guardian.
"My first apartment was empty. I had to put up bin bags as curtains. I was crying."
These days, Cabral is enjoying warmer climates. In June 2026, he moved to Turkish club Trabzonspor.
'We've put ourselves on the map'
Argentina, who ranked number two in the world and count football great Lionel Messi among its ranks, didn't have it easy against Cape Verde on Saturday.
An extra-time goal gave Argentina the edge to sprint past the World Cup debutants 3-2 in Miami.
Vozinha told the media his team was leaving with their heads held high.
"We went toe-to-toe with Argentina, fighting on equal terms for an equal result, but couldn't get it.
"That's football."
Despite their failure to advance, Pico told BBC Sport their performance put Cape Verde on the map.
"Nobody asks where Cape Verde is on the map anymore. This is history in itself. We've put ourselves on the map," he said.
"We're a small nation but with big hearts and we showed what is possible.
"If you believe, you can achieve."
-with additional reporting from AP and Reuters.
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