Cape Verde vs South Africa prediction 03.02.2024

• Competition: Africa Cup of Nations, Quarter-Finals
• Date: Saturday, 3rd February 2024
• Kickoff: 20:00 UK / 21:00 CET
• Venue: Charles Konan Banny Stadium (Yamoussoukro)

Cape Verde, the fourth-smallest country in Africa (by population), is the tournament's biggest surprise. The popular Blue Sharks are undefeated in the AFCON while playing well against some highly favored teams like Ghana and Egypt. However, even though Cape Verde is a really small country, their players are playing for good European teams, and this success is by no means luck. Having watched all of their games, we can safely say they are playing great and we wouldn't be too surprised if they would go and win the whole thing. 

In recent years, South Africa haven't been great as they failed to even qualify for AFCON last time and also failed to qualify for the World Cup on the previous three occasions. In this AFCON, they were solid in Group E with Mali, Namibia, and Tunisia, finishing 2nd. In the 1/8 Finals, South Africa met Morocco, and even though Morocco was a lot better, South Africa somehow ensured the win and secured the next stage of the competition. 

Cape Verde vs South Africa pick: Cape Verde to (AH 0) win

Cape Verde played great in this competition, winning three of four games. The only game where they failed to win was vs Egypt (2:2) when Cape Verde already secured the knockout phase. However, in that match vs Egypt, Cape Verde was pretty good, and even the stats don't show they were equally dangerous as their opponent. 

South Africa was solid throughout the competition, but the last win vs Morocco was pretty lucky, in our opinion. Morocco totally outplayed them, even missing a penalty and having one goal disallowed by VAR.

A few years ago, it would be crazy to think that Cape Verde would be the favorite against South Africa. However, at this point, we believe that the Blue Sharks are slightly better than the popular "Bafana Bafana" and we expect them in the Semi-Finals.