Pico Lopes' year to remember: new son, league crown and World Cup dream realised 

YEAR TO REMEMBER: From becoming the first League of Ireland stalwart to qualify for the World Cup to fatherhood and then reclaiming the league title with Shamrock Rovers its been a joyful three weeks. Picture: Cristiano Barbosa/Sportsfile

As a former bank teller, Pico Lopes realises you can’t put a price on the joy he’s indulged in the past three weeks.

From becoming the first League of Ireland stalwart to qualify for the World Cup to fatherhood and then reclaiming the league title with Shamrock Rovers.

Newborn son Diego will be at Lansdowne Road on Sunday, part of the crowd watching his Dad chasing a first Hoops double for 38 years.

Regardless of whether that plan is derailed by Cork City, Lopes is the success story of this year’s domestic league.

December 5 can’t come quick enough; the day his Cape Verde side will discover their opponents for the summer World Cup and, as he notes, the first RTÉ Toy Show of relevance in his household.

The fairytale is all the more remarkable given the 33-year-old wasn’t even a full-time footballer a decade ago.

While his peers, including John Egan and Matt Doherty whom he couldn’t dislodge for a place in the Ireland youth squad, had moved to the UK, he got his break in a depleted Bohemians team serrated by the effects of the economic crash.

That was 2010 and it wasn’t for another five years that he could begin to call himself a footballer.

A teammate of his at Bohs, Glenn Cronin, recommended the centre-back to Stephen Bradley when they were revamping the Shamrock Rovers squad.

Together, they’ve gone on to dominate the domestic scene, lifting five Premier Division titles in the space of six years and reaching the group stages of European competition on three occasions.

“I was on the desk at ESB Blanchardstown dealing with customers,” he recalled. “They’d drop in at 5.30pm to lodge money and I’d be dashing down to Dalymount for training at 6pm.

“I was living at home with my parents in Crumlin. As my Dad said, once I was able to chip in at home for the electricity bills and food, it was all good.

“Rovers were the first club to offer 52-week contracts, meaning for once I didn’t need a job at Christmas to earn a living.

“They were tough times but I suppose to be where I am now it was all worth it.”

Famously, it was through his father, Cape Verde-born Carlos, that his international career switched from chasing the Ireland dream. His full debut came at 27.

All of his age-group, including Robbie Brady, Jeff Hendrick and Shane Duffy, won’t get to sample in their lifetimes the World Cup buzz that awaits Lopes in North America.

Such has been the hectic schedule, jetting back from clinching qualification in Africa to the maternity ward and then onto the pitch for the Rovers run-in, that the magnitude hasn’t fully permeated.

“In the back of your mind you’re thinking ‘this is ahead’ but there is so much to do in the meantime,” he says of the itinerary which runs until the final Conference League game on December 18.

“You can’t take your eye off the ball but I can guarantee that sometime around Christmas, I will be singing songs with my friends about going to the World Cup.” 

He’s activated parental leave to skip an international friendly in January, affording scope to plan their trip of a lifetime.

“We’ve been on the go all year so I'll spend time with Leah and Diego, hopefully establish a routine where we can get seven hours of sleep straight per night. I know that’s wishful thinking.

“Diego’s birth-cert will be out soon and the next step will be his passport. I’m not sure we’ll get a Cape Verdean one just yet - but we’ll get the two, just in case he needs a call-up.

“It was an idea we had that, if we qualified, we’d all go. It won’t happen for me again in my time so what better way to have your first family holiday than at a World Cup. We’ve made this a reality.”