In the early morning of October 14 (Vietnam time), the Cape Verde team - a country of only nearly 600,000 people - made history when defeating Eswatini 3-0, thereby officially winning a ticket to the first World Cup in the history of football in this country.
In the final match of Group D of the African qualifiers, Cape Verde has the right to decide. With just a defeat to the weakest opponent in the group, coach Leitao Brito and his team will preserve the top spot in the face of fierce competition from Cameroon.
Under the enthusiastic support of the home crowd, Cape Verde completely dominated Eswatini and scored 3 goals in the second half, all from close-range shots by Rocha Livramento, Willy Semedo and Stopira.
Meanwhile, Cameroon declined in spirit and were held to a 0-0 draw by Angola, thereby sadly concluding the qualifying round in second place. At the end of Group D, Cape Verde officially won a direct ticket to the 2026 World Cup. They became the next name - after Jordan and Uzbekistan - to participate in the biggest football festival on the planet for the first time in history.
This is a worthy reward for Livramento's impressive performance with their teammates, when they were unbeaten in 6 consecutive matches, including a turning point 1-0 victory over Cameroon.
According to Transfermarkt, Cape Verde's total squad value is only about 27.2 million Euros. The two most expensive stars of the West African team are Wagner Pina (Trabzonspor, Türkiye) and Kevin Lenini (Krasnodar, Russia), each valued at 5 million Euros.
