Sidny Cabral to snub Messi, reveals whose shirt he'll ask for | OneFootball

Sidny Cabral is attracting huge attention at the World Cup, not only because of Cape Verde’s historic campaign, but also because of the remarks he made before the clash with Argentina, scheduled for this Friday, in which the former Benfica player ended up surprising everyone. The 23-year-old full-back revealed that, although he considers Messi “the best player of all time” and admits it will be an honor to face him, it is not with the Argentine star that he wants to swap shirts, but rather Nicolás Otamendi.

“I’m going to swap (shirts) with Otamendi, who was my teammate last season. Messi? It’s a great honor to play against him, he is the best of all time, but we have to stay focused on what we can do,” he said in an interview with AS.

The Cape Verde international, now a Trabzonspor player, also showed great confidence for the round of 32 match, assuring that the team coached by Bubista fully believes in the possibility of eliminating the world champions. “It will be a difficult game for us, it will be intense, and we will prepare well for this match. We have been doing a great job, we feel very secure and we believe that we will play a great game against Argentina and make it through to the next round”, he said.

Sidny Cabral also recalled the draw against Spain, a result that allowed the Africans to make history. “We were all very happy. Even before the game started we weren’t very nervous; we focused on ourselves, on our game and on our plan. After the game, we just celebrated”, he revealed.

In addition to the journey on the pitch, the winger revealed that the excitement in Cape Verde has reached unprecedented levels, explaining that the whole country is following the national team with enormous passion and that even the rise in popularity of goalkeeper Vozinha, after his performance against Spain, has been impressive, as the team prepares to try to pull off one of the biggest upsets of this World Cup against powerful Argentina.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.