Pico Lopes to make Cape Verde Squad World Cup debut against Spain
Roberto “Pico” Lopes is set to become the first active League of Ireland footballer to play at a World Cup when cape verde squad face Spain on Monday evening in Atlanta. The Shamrock Rovers defender, 33, will do it at 5pm Irish time in a group that already carries one sharp edge: Cape Verde finished ahead of Cameroon to reach the tournament.
Pico Lopes and Spain
Lopes has 44 caps for Cape Verde and is now in position to add a World Cup appearance to that record. He started playing football in Loreto primary school in Crumlin, with Lourdes Celtic Football Club around the corner from the family home.
That route matters because it reaches from local school football in Dublin to a World Cup match against Spain in Atlanta. It also puts a League of Ireland player into a stage no active player from the competition has reached before.
Cape Verde diaspora route
Cape Verde’s path to this moment ran through its diaspora as much as through its results. The country has a population of about 530,000 across 10 islands, and the federation recruited eligible players from overseas, including Lopes, as part of that push.
He was first contacted on LinkedIn in 2018 with a view to representing Cape Verde. The message was written in Portuguese and he thought it was spam, so he ignored it. Nine months later, then-head coach Rui Águas came back in English and asked him, “would you like to represent the country of your father?”
Crumlin, 1988
The family story in Crumlin gives the move a sharper edge. Carlos Lopes was born on São Nicolau and left Cape Verde at 16 to go seafaring before he and Judy Lopes settled in Dublin in the 1980s. They bought a home in a new Crumlin development in 1988, and Judy said, “We hadn’t a clue about football.”
Carlos Lopes has watched the arc turn from childhood kickabouts to the World Cup. “When he was a small baby, he was always carrying a ball in his hands. His dream was to become a footballer,” he said. “Now, he’s in the World Cup. That’s his dream done.” When Pico says football is tough, his father still answers with the same line: “Dad, it is 11 men against 11 men.”
The World Cup place also arrives with a family milestone around it. Last year, Lopes and his wife Leah bought his parents a baby-blue shark toy when they announced she was pregnant, and last October they welcomed Diego. He is at the tournament with Leah and Pico’s brothers, while Lopes prepares for a Monday evening that links Crumlin, Cape Verde and Atlanta in one match.
