{"id":1809,"date":"2026-06-20T07:10:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T07:10:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=1809"},"modified":"2026-06-20T07:10:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T07:10:16","slug":"cape-verdes-roberto-lopes-was-working-at-a-bank-when-he-was-recruited-on-linkedin-to-play-soccer-he-thought-it-was-spam-now-hes-at-the-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=1809","title":{"rendered":"Cape Verde\u2019s Roberto Lopes was working at a bank when he was recruited on LinkedIn to play soccer\u2014he thought it was spam, now he\u2019s at the World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>At the time, Lopes\u2014nicknamed \u201cPico\u201d\u2014was working at a Dublin bank while playing part-time for Shamrock Rovers, an Irish soccer club. Born to an Irish mother and a Cape Verdean father, he had unknowingly been flagged by Cape Verde national team coach Rui Aguas, who was searching for eligible players to bolster the squad of the small West African island nation.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=1807\">Jeff Bezos pledged $10 billion for climate change. With the 2030 clock ticking, his wife, Lauren S\u00e1nchez Bezos, is leading the charge to spend it<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Nine months later, Aguas followed up\u2014this time in English\u2014asking if Lopes had seen his earlier message.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u201cI copied the [initial] message and put it into Google Translate, and it basically said, \u2018We\u2019re looking at getting new players into the Cape Verde squad and would you be interested in declaring for Cape Verde?\u2019\u201d Lopes recalled to <em>BBC Sport<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was absolutely buzzing with that. I was like, \u2018Yep, 100% I\u2019d love to be a part of the squad\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Just three weeks later, after scrambling to get documents from his father like a birth certificate and passport, Lopes was on a plane to make his international debut against Togo.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2>Now, Cape Verde and Lopes are making their World Cup debut<\/h2>\n<p>Over the next seven years, Lopes became a fixture in the national team as Cape Verde transformed from a minnow on the international stage into one of the 2026 World Cup\u2018s surprise stories.\u00a0<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Last week, the nation made its first-ever appearance at the tournament and opened with a scoreless draw against Spain\u2014a remarkable result given the matchup featured the world\u2019s No. 3-ranked team against No. 64. For Lopes, the opportunity has been hard to believe.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFrom when I was a young child, and I imagine every aspiring footballer when they were young, they wanted to play at the highest level possible and, for me, it doesn\u2019t go any further than the World Cup,\u201d Lopes said.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u201cBeing able to represent my family playing for the national team and being able to put our family name out there at one of the biggest sporting events in the world fills me with great pride.\u201d<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<h2>Lopes says leaving banking for soccer was actually \u2018risky\u2019\u00a0<\/h2>\n<p>In hindsight, Lopes\u2019s decision to accept the call-up may seem obvious. The opportunity ultimately took him from a bank desk in Dublin to the world\u2019s biggest sporting stage, helping him build a professional football career and land partnerships with brands such as Intersport Elverys.\u00a0<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>But at the time, there was no guarantee the gamble would pay off.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was risky because I was in a solid job,\u201d Lopes recalled in a FIFA video released this week. \u201cWhere our league was at that moment, there wasn\u2019t much security in terms of a career in football, so when [Aguas] spoke to me about his plan, his ideas, and what he had going forward, I had to be a part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=1805\">Both U.S. and Chinese AI firms are setting up shop in Singapore. Can the country become Asia\u2019s neutral AI hub?<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Lopes initially viewed it as a short-term experiment\u2014maybe two years\u2014but what followed has stretched far beyond that horizon: \u201cI would say we\u2019ve achieved what we wanted to achieve, but we still want more as well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That tension between risk and reward is hardly unique to soccer. Much like entrepreneurs leaving stable jobs to launch startups or professionals betting on an unconventional opportunity, elite athletes often make career-defining decisions without knowing how they\u2019ll end. For some, the leap never lands. For others, it changes everything.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Richardo Pepi offers a similar example. The 23-year-old\u2019s U.S. national team star\u2019s rise is not only a testament to his talent but also to years of sacrifice by his family.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou used to do whatever you needed to do to get that money and take them,\u201d Ricardo\u2019s father, Daniel Pepi, said, of funding youth soccer. \u201cSometimes we used to borrow some money. Sometimes I would ask for a loan at my job, or from my dad. Sometimes I had to pawn the title to the car. Whatever we had to do to just keep going.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Even global stars like Cristiano Ronald have described a childhood marked by financial hardship.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I was a kid, 11 or 12 years old, we didn\u2019t have money,\u201d the Portuguese strike recalled to ITV in 2019. Raised in a struggling household in Madeira, Ronald has often spoken about the hardships that shaped his early life\u2014and have even led him down a path to become one of few billionaire athletes.<\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>But despite their individual backgrounds, the one thing pulling each of the athletes together has been their willingness risks\u2014even when the result is entirely unknown.<\/p>\n<p>Or, as Microsoft executive vice president Ryan Roslansky\u2014who oversees LinkedIn\u2014put it more simply: \u201cBig win for recruiters who don\u2019t give up on a great candidate.\u201d<\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Cape Verde will next take on Uruguay on June 21 and Saudi Arabia on June 26.<\/p>\n<p><em>Will you be skipping out on work to watch the World Cup? Fortune wants to hear from you<\/em>. Email\u00a0preston.fore@fortune.com.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=1803\">Miserable K-shaped economy might actually be fading, as lower-income families bounce back, says Bank of America<\/a><\/p>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Roberto &#8220;Pico&#8221; Lopes was working at a bank when a cold message changed his life. Seven years later, he&#8217;s helping Cape Verde make World Cup history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-careers"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Cape Verde\u2019s Roberto Lopes was working at a bank when he was recruited on LinkedIn to play soccer\u2014he thought it was spam, now he\u2019s at the World Cup - Cross Country Moving Team<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=1809\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cape Verde\u2019s Roberto Lopes was working at a bank when he was recruited on LinkedIn to play soccer\u2014he thought it was spam, now he\u2019s at the World Cup - Cross Country Moving Team\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Roberto &quot;Pico&quot; Lopes was working at a bank when a cold message changed his life. 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