First Touch ’26 - Cape Verde

To find Cape Verde on a map, you have to keep zooming in. This is what the football world has had to do to understand: how the tiny Atlantic archipelago became a World Cup nation.

In this World Cup Capsule, David Gass traces the Blue Sharks’ rise from post-independence minnows to AFCON regulars and, finally, first-time World Cup qualifiers. We explore how a country of just over half a million people used its vast diaspora—stretching from Portugal and Rotterdam to New England and Ireland—to build a competitive squad, recruiting players on LinkedIn and in lower European leagues while investing in new training facilities with FIFA funding. Manager Bubista’s insistence that Cape Verdean Creole be the “official language” of the team has forged a strong shared identity, even as dual nationals flood in. We revisit 2013 and 2023 AFCON upsets, the dramatic qualifying win over Eswatini, and spotlight forward Dailon Livramento, whose goals clinched their ticket. From half-day national holidays to parties in Brockton and Lisbon, this is the story of the smallest World Cup nation punching far above its weight.