Curaçao — 2026 World Cup Squad

Do the math and it looks unkind. Curacao count roughly 150,000 souls back home, making them the tiniest territory ever to gatecrash a World Cup, and Group E has handed them Ecuador and the Ivory Coast for company. Nobody on this side of the bracket is picking the islanders to advance. What they can do is make an afternoon awkward, and they have the players to try.

The plan starts at the back and works outward. Armando Obispo brings PSV's composure to the centre of defence, Riechedly Bazoer adds Konyaspor steel beside him, and Joshua Brenet shuttles up the flank from Kayserispor. Eloy Room, now minding the net at Miami FC, is the calm voice organising all of it. Up top, Tahith Chong gives Sheffield United's crowd something familiar to cheer, drifting in off the left, while Sontje Hansen carries Middlesbrough's directness through the middle.

So expect deep lines, patient defending, and quick breaks whenever a half-chance appears. The deeper tale is one of bloodlines and borrowed academies, a Dutch-schooled Caribbean squad turning a speck on the map into one of football's unlikeliest stories.