Kyle Lightbourne has been involved with Bermudan soccer for 30 years. Lightbourne’s playing career began on the island in the late 80s and ended there in 2009 – in between he had a solid career in England – and he has been managing ever since. Bermuda’s debut in this month’s Concacaf Gold Cup would be the culmination of his life’s work, except his ambitions go further.

“I always believed that anything that is given to us is easy but the things that you work for are harder and you appreciate them more,” Lightbourne tells the Guardian. “That’s the way I’ve lived my life, I’ve had to work to get whatever I’ve achieved and that’s what I want the team to work for and believe that we belong at this level.”

Bermuda, with a population of just over 65,000, will be the smallest nation outside of Oceania to ever compete in a senior men’s Confederation championship. That figure is smaller than combined capacities of the three stadiums it will play in during the group stage. Though the country has less than one-fifth the population of Iceland, Bermudan FA resident Mark Wade said he thinks the program can follow in Iceland’s footsteps and use the Gold Cup as a starting point for an eventual berth in the World Cup.

“I’m expecting us to learn a lot about ourselves and I’m certainly expecting us to do well in the tournament,” Wade says. “The boys here in training camp in Bermuda are buzzing and they want to challenge themselves against Costa Rica who made the World Cup, and that’s something that they want to do.”

Wade is betting on Fifa to finalize a 48-team World Cup for the 2026 tournament co-hosted by the US, Canada and Mexico.

Bermuda open the Gold Cup against Haiti before facing Costa Rica and Nicaragua, and a potential meeting with Mexico if they make the quarter-finals. The coming games are a chance for Bermuda’s players, many of whom play their domestic soccer on the island, to showcase their talents to international scouts.

“It’s the opportunity for players and we’ve spoken to them about it,” Lightbourne says. “We have a lot of players who have a lot of potential. They know that and this is the opportunity for them to show it.”

Bermuda’s success so far comes from its total integration of national teams from youth to senior levels. The island is smaller than Manhattan, so Lightbourne says it is easy for players to come together and train every week. As a result, the FA has all its young players train together for six months before choosing the teams to compete in summer tournaments. Senior coaches train U-20 and U-17 players and exceptional young players get called up to the senior team well before they turn 21.

One example is Zeiko Lewis. The attacking midfielder began training at the national program at the Under 13 level and made his senior debut before turning 17. Lewis moved to the US and enjoyed a successful career at Boston College becoming the school’s all-time assists leader before getting drafted by the New York Red Bulls in 2017. Now with the Charleston Battery of the USL Championship, Lewis says he hopes young players can follow in his footsteps.

“I went to America to show that you can get your degree and play professionally even to show that if you don’t want to play professionally, you can at least get a degree,” he says. “There’s a lot of kids who used to shy away from that because they had to leave the island and they ended up getting trapped in and staying on the island, being in a comfort zone and having your friends stay there.”

Although violent crime remains low on the island, Bermuda has seen rises in petty crime and small gang activity. Firearm offenses have risen, according to Bermuda Police Service statistics, as have thefts. The Pan-American Health Organization noted antisocial behavior as a challenge and the island’s health service has been criticized for not conducting adequate research into mental health concerns amongst the population.

“Some people get lost into violence and gangs but at the end of the day, we’re showing them that there’s a brighter path for them to go on,” Lewis says. “Especially being in small country, where you basically know everybody, and you begin to feel like that most of the world doesn’t care about Bermudians and that ‘I’m not going to get my chance’.”

Bermuda has a history of producing successful players. Clyde Best’s career with West Ham in the 60s and 70s is the best example but Zeiko’s grandfather Fred also played in the original North American Soccer League. Lightbourne, meanwhile, played for nine different teams in the UK and his striker, Nahki Wells, is contracted with Burnley. Promising attacking midfielder Kane Crichlow just signed with Watford.

“Bermuda over the years has traditionally produced good players but we haven’t produced good teams,” Lightbourne said. “We want to change that mindset and we have a lot of young players getting a lot of good coaching at a young age overseas so we want to make the national team available to them as soon as they come of age so that we can stay in contact with them and keep building our program. All of our players who play for Bermuda were Bermudian born. It’s not like their parents or grandparents were Bermudian, they’ve all played in Bermuda at some point in their career and in our leagues.”

With Concacaf Nations League games providing the opportunity for Bermuda’s full-strength squad to play together more often, a stronger sense of cohesion exists with the players. Wells was among a handful of European-based players who were able to rejoin the national team for portions of qualifying and he scored in both of the games he played.

“It might take a day or two for us to readjust to how some of us have changed our playing styles because of the different places we’ve gone but we all know the system and we know essentially how we were brought up and where we come from,” Lewis says. “We have a basic background of who we are and who each individual is and we’re all really good friends so that helps us a lot. The connection is always there.”

Those ties were tested after Bermuda lost their first Nations League qualifying game to Aruba. The loss prompted the team to hold a meeting, and Lewis says players were able to be frank with each other about their shortcomings because of the experience and camaraderie they had built up over the years. After that loss, Bermuda went to win their next three games by a combined score of 16–1. Those bonds will face the stress of tournament play and Lewis said they’re ready.

“We have a saying ‘we are Bermudians’ so it has helped us grow a lot being small. Our entire lives have always been us against the world. We’ve always heard how we come from a small country and not have much to produce so when we come out on a big stage, we’re going to show that although we’re small, we have a lot of heart and we’re mighty.”