Cabo Verde goes into Sunday’s match against Uruguay with its coach insisting the team is not getting carried away by the noise around its 0-0 draw with Spain. Pedro Brito, known as Bubista, said the celebration has been bigger outside the squad than inside it, and that his players are keeping their minds on the next step in Group H.
The draw in Cabo Verde’s World Cup debut changed the mood around the team at once. It put the side into the global spotlight and turned a meeting with Uruguay on Sunday, June 21, into a far sharper test than it would have been before Spain was held scoreless.
Bubista said the squad is “very focused and quite calm” and that its concentration must be at 200%. He said the team wants to live in the present and keep the celebration outside its base, even as Cabo Verdeans at home and around the world have turned the result into a reason to celebrate.
Garry Rodrigues gave that support a more vivid shape. He said the team is feeling backing “from all sides” and that Cabo Verde has a lot of support at the World Cup. He added that he could not hear Spain’s fans because the Cabo Verde supporters were so loud, a detail that captures how unusual the atmosphere has become around the squad.
That is the friction Cabo Verde now has to manage: public celebration on one side, competitive discipline on the other. The result against Spain made the team a story beyond its own camp, but Bubista is trying to keep the players inside the tournament, not outside it. For them, the next answer comes on Sunday against Uruguay, where the size of the moment will matter less than whether the same focus holds.
