The team from the small African island country won a place after betting on players with Cape Verdean ancestry in Europe
The Cape Verde team stamped its passport for the 2026 World Cup on Monday (14.Oct.2025). It will be the small African island nation’s first participation in the biggest global sporting event after investments in local football infrastructure and the search for players with Cape Verdean ancestry.
Cape Verde is the “poorest” country to qualify for the next edition of the tournament. The IMF (International Monetary Fund) estimates that the African nation’s GDP (Gross Domestic Product) will total US$ 2.92 billion in 2025. The figure is 12 times lower than that of Senegal, the 2nd nation with the smallest economy ever confirmed.
Survey of Poder360 from IMF data from 1982 to 2025 also shows that Cape Verde has the lowest GDP of all World Cups. It surpasses that of Togo (US$3.17 billion in current values), which played in the 2006 World Cup in Germany led by goalscorer Emmanuel Adebayor.
The list of countries with the lowest GDPs competing in the World Cup includes mostly African and Latin American nations. Below is the ranking:
Cape Verde was a Portuguese colony until 1975. In the years preceding the country’s independence, the migratory flow to Europe intensified. The result of this is that 14 of the 25 players called up for the matches that sealed qualification for the World Cup were born in other countries, mainly the Netherlands and Portugal.
The movement is explained by the size of the country. Cape Verde has approximately 525 thousand inhabitants spread across its 10 islands. The number places the country as the 2nd smallest country to compete in the group stage of a FIFA World Cup. It only loses to Iceland in 2018.
The rise of Cape Verdean football was a long process. The local federation was only founded in 1982 and became part of FIFA 4 years later. It took another 40 years until his first qualification for a World Cup.
The Cape Verde team is currently ranked 70th in the ranking of FIFA, ahead of other teams that will go to next year’s World Cup, such as Ghana and New Zealand. The peak was in 2014, when it reached 27th place, but for most of its history, the Blue Sharks (as the team is known) were outside the top 100 from the entity.
The turning point was the unprecedented qualification for the 2013 African Cup of Nations. That year, Cape Verde broke through top 50 for the 1st time. Since then, the team has played in 3 more continental tournaments out of 6 possible. It achieved its best result in the last edition, in 2023, falling in the quarter-finals to South Africa on penalties.
In the junior categories, the process is still in its infancy. As the main team is still dependent on the diaspora, a large part of the squad represented other countries in grassroots tournaments. FIFA only authorizes the change of selection of athletes who have never played in an official match (friendlies do not count) for another. This is the case for more than half of Cape Verde’s current team.
The result of this is that the country’s youth teams are unable to compete in the under-23, under-20 and under-17 African Nations Cups. This leads the federation to increase investments in young players and intensify the search for descendants in European football.
Another weak point is local team football. Currently, no player called up plays on Cape Verdean soil. They are spread across leagues such as the Portuguese, Israeli and Turkish. There are also athletes in more alternative markets such as the Cypriot and Bulgarian championships. Meanwhile, the Cape Verdean 1st division does not even offer a place in the African Champions League.
2026 World Cup
The 2026 World Cup will be the 1st edition after the expansion to 48 teams. The tournament will be held from June 11 to July 26 in the United States, Mexico and Canada. It is also the first time the tournament has been held in 3 host countries. Mexico will host the World Cup for the 3rd time (1970 and 1986) and the USA for the 2nd (1994).
Cape Verde joins 27 other teams already classified, including the 3 hosts. The Brazilian team is also confirmed in its 23rd World Cup. Amarelinha is the only one to compete in all editions and will seek its 6th title next year. Here is the list of qualified teams:
There are still 20 countries left to complete the table. The continental qualifiers will be concluded on the next FIFA Date, from November 10th to 18th, when 14 more teams will stamp their passports for the World Cup. The remaining 6 vacancies will be defined in the play-offsin March 2026. These matches will define the last 4 classified in Europe and 2 of the intercontinental knockout stages.
The 42 classified teams and the 6 slots of the play-offs will be divided into 12 groups of 4 teams each. The draw is scheduled for December 5th in the North American capital, Washington DC
