Morning all.
Let’s start with Cabo Verde and their incredible 0-0 draw with Spain yesterday. If Curucao had a moment against Germany, this was something altogether more impressive. I think the best thing for me to do is send you in the direction of Sid Lowe’s piece in The Guardian which, as you’d expect, is expertly written from someone who knows Spain and Spanish football inside out.
Of course the story isn’t really about the footballing giants, who had 27 attempts on goal, but the way Cabo Verde defended. Everything on the line. A 40 year old goalkeeper, apparently an Arsenal fan too, making brilliant saves (and the world being what it is, gaining over one million Instagram followers in the process). Defenders staying organised and disciplined, and getting in the way of 8 of those 27 shots. Late on, there was a big chance for Real Sociedad striker Mikel Oryazabal, but his goal-bound shot was blocked by a piece of a defending so committed it would get the Gabriel Magalhaes seal of approval.
The blocker? Roberto ‘Pico’ Lopes. A 33 year old central defender who grew up in Crumlin, not far from where I sit here in Dublin, to an Irish mum and a dad from one of the 10 islands of Cabo Verde. He has played in the League of Ireland for his entire career, starting with Bohemians before making a move across the city to Shamrock Rovers (currently managed by former Arsenal youth prospect Stephen Bradley).
He made his way into the international game in an unusual fashion choosing, as many sensible do, to ignore a random message on LinkedIn (it might be one of those Diary of a CEO type wankers – best avoided, in my opinion). Anyway, here’s the story in his own words:
When I was younger and how I started in international football was basically due to me being in college, and I had to set up a LinkedIn account. I connected with a few friends and sort of left it in the dark, like for a few years, maybe checking it occasionally.
Then one day I got a message from the manager of the Cabo Verde team at the time, Rui Aguas. He dropped a welcome message in Portuguese, which I didn’t speak at the time and I just assumed it was like a ‘thanks for connecting with me’ sort of message, or spam, and I rudely ignored it.
I just thought it was nothing. I went on with my life for about nine months until he messaged me again, this time in English, asking if I’d thought about the opportunity. So I did what I should have done the first time and just copied and pasted it into Google Translate. I did that and I messaged him as quick as I could, apologised profusely and said, ‘Look, if the opportunity is still available, I’d love to be a part of this’.
Three weeks later, I was in Marseille making my debut for Cabo Verde.
On its own a remarkable tale but for it then to play out at the World Cup the way it did yesterday was genuinely incredible. I’m sure Spain will right their course, they have too much quality not to, but for this morning, let the spotlight shine on the team, the players, and the nation who probably expected to come out on the wrong side of this result. At Premier League level, we don’t really get underdog stories, because there’s so much money even the worst teams have spent tens, if not hundreds, of millions to build their squads. So stuff like this can only happen in the cups, and even that is more rare than it ever was because of the financial disparities between the clubs these days.
This was absolutely that though. Top quality underdogging. Football as the great leveler, and while I do think the expanded tournament has its downsides, it also allowed something like this to happen – and for history to be written for Cabo Verde. Fair play 🙌.
Elsewhere, Leandro Trossard played the full 90 as Belgium drew 1-1 with Egypt, Romelu Lukaku making an immediate impact off the bench and forcing an own goal after a season where he played a grand total of 64 minutes for Napoli because of injury. Uruguay and Saudi Arabia drew 1-1, and at SoFi in Los Angeles, Iran twice came from behind to draw 2-2 with New Zealand. I enjoyed NZ’s second, some lovely football before a good finish from Motherwell’s Elijah Just.
Today, Arsenal involvement could come in the shape of William Saliba as France face Senegal in what could be a cracking game, although he’s been struggling with a reported back injury, and Martin Odegaard’s Norway take on Iraq. Overnight Algeria play Argentina, while Austria play Jordan. Let’s see what today throws up.
Right, I’ll leave it there for now, but there’s a brand new Arsecast Extra for you below if you haven’t had a chance to listen yet. Enjoy!