Islands beat South Africa

TINY Cape Verde Islands catapulted themselves into surprise World Cup contention with a 2-1 victory away to South Africa yesterday.

The small island nation shook up the African qualifiers as they registered a second successive win over South Africa that suddenly sees a country of 500,000 inhabitants in with a chance of a fairytale trip to Russia.

Nigeria look best placed to become the first of the five African teams to book a place in Russia.