Cape Verde Shocks Spain After Recruiting Talent Through LinkedIn

Cape Verde have reached the World Cup for the first time in their history and opened the tournament with a stunning 0-0 draw against Spain. The island nation became the third-smallest country ever to appear at a World Cup, after Curaçao and ahead of other tiny qualifiers in the competition’s history. It has about 600,000 residents, officially 593,139, making it the third-smallest population in Africa and far smaller than Jerusalem.

The team’s rise is credited to coach Bubista, a former little-known player with only two appearances in Spain’s second division in the 1990s, who took charge in 2020. Since then, he has won 31 of 64 matches, a 48% success rate, while guiding Cape Verde through a qualifying group that included a strong Cameroon side. The squad is built around players born or raised in the Netherlands, Portugal, France, England and the United States.

Among the names familiar to Israeli fans are Hélio Varela of Maccabi Tel Aviv and former Beitar Jerusalem and Maccabi Netanya players Aylsson and Heriberto Tavares, though the latter two were involved in qualification but were not selected for the World Cup squad. Former Hapoel Beersheba defender Carlos Ponck also played for the national team until 2022, making 22 appearances.

One of the most unusual parts of the story is how Cape Verde found players abroad. Bubista used LinkedIn to contact Robert Lopes, who was born in Dublin to an Irish mother and a Cape Verdean father. Lopes said he ignored a message in Portuguese for nine months, thinking it was spam, until the coach followed up. After using Google Translate, he realized the invitation was real and accepted immediately. Lopes now has 39 caps and says the unexpected message launched his international career. After Spain, Cape Verde next face Uruguay, as one of the tournament’s underdogs.