Pelé, the Brazilian soccer legend who won three World Cups and became the sport's first global icon, has died at the age of 82.
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| King Pele |
"Everything that we are, is thanks to you," his daughter Kely Nascimento wrote in a post on Instagram, under an image of family members holding Pele's hands. "We love you infinitely. Rest in peace."
Pelé was admitted to a hospital in São Paulo in late November for a respiratory infection and for complications related to colon cancer. Last week, the hospital said his health had worsened as his cancer progressed. He died on Thursday from multiple organ failure due to the progression of colon cancer, according to a statement from Albert Einstein Hospital.
For more than 60 years, the name Pelé has been synonymous with soccer. He played in four World Cups and is the only player in history to win three, but his legacy stretched far beyond his trophy haul and remarkable goal-scoring record.
"I was born to play football, just like Beethoven was born to write music and Michelangelo was born to paint," Pelé famously said.
Tributes have been pouring in for the soccer legend. Pelé's first club, Santos FC, responded to the news on Twitter with the words "eternal" shared next to an image of a crown.
Brazilian footballer Neymar said Pelé "changed everything." In a post on Instagram, he wrote: "He turned football into art, into entertainment. He gave a voice to the poor, to black people and especially: He gave visibility to Brazil. Football and Brazil have raised their status thanks to the King!" he added.
Portuguese star forward Cristiano Ronaldo sent his condolences to Brazil in a post on Instagram, saying "a mere "goodbye" to the eternal King Pelé will never be enough to express the pain that currently engulfs the entire football world."
Kylian Mbappé of Paris Saint-Germain said of Pelé's death: "The king of football has left us but his legacy will never be forgotten."
Former English soccer player Geoff Hurst wrote on Twitter of his memories of Pelé, calling the late star "without doubt the best footballer I ever played against (with Bobby Moore being the best footballer I ever played alongside). For me Pele remains the greatest of all time and I was proud to be on the the pitch with him. RIP Pele and thank you."
Brazil's incoming President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took to Twitter to pay his respects to Pelé, saying "few Brazilians took the name of our country as far as he did."
"As different from Portuguese as the language was, foreigners from the four corners of the planet soon found a way to pronounce the magic word: 'Pelé,'" Lula added.
A public wake will be held for Pelé on Monday at the Urbano Caldeira stadium, popularly known as Vila Belmiro and home to Santos football club, in Brazil's São Paulo state, according to a Thursday statement from Santos FC.
At dawn Monday, Pele's body will be moved from the Albert Einstein Hospital to the stadium. The soccer legend's coffin will be placed in the center of the pitch.
The wake at Vila Belmiro will continue until Tuesday 10 a.m. local time (8 a.m. ET), after which a funeral procession will carry Pelé's coffin through the streets of the city of Santos, including the street where Pelé's 100-year-old mother, Celeste Arantes, lives.
The cortege will continue to Pelé's final resting place, the Memorial Necrópole Ecumênica cemetery in Santos, where a private funeral, reserved for family members, will be held.
Dazzling ability
Pelé was born Edson Arantes do Nascimento in Três Corações -- an inland city roughly 155 miles northwest of Rio de Janeiro -- in 1940, before his family moved to the city of Bauru in São Paulo.
The genesis of the nickname Pelé are unclear, even to the footballer. He once wrote in the British newspaper The Guardian that it likely started with school classmates teasing him for mangling the nickname of another player, Bilé. Whatever the origin, the moniker stuck.
Exactly how many goals Pelé scored during his career is unclear, and his Guinness World Records tally has come under scrutiny with many scored in unofficial matches.
As a child, his first taste of soccer involved playing barefoot with socks and rags rolled up into a ball -- a humble beginning that would grow into a long and fruitful career.
But when he first took up the game, his ambitions were modest.
"My dad was a good football player, he scored a lot of goals," Pelé told CNN in 2015. "His name was Dondinho; I wanted to be like him.
"He was famous in Brazil, in Minas Gerais. He was my role model. I always wanted to be like him, but what happened, to this day, only God can explain."
As a teenager, Pelé left home and began training with Santos, scoring his first goal for the club side before his 16th birthday. He would go on to score 619 times over 638 appearances for the club, but it is his feats in the iconic yellow jersey of Brazil for which he is best remembered.
The world first got a glimpse of Pelé's dazzling ability in 1958, when he made his World Cup debut aged 17. He scored Brazil's only goal in the country's quarterfinal victory against Wales, then netted a hat-trick in the semifinal against France and two in the final against host Sweden.
Brazil players hold a banner showing support for former Brazil player Pele after the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 Round of 16 match between Brazil and South Korea on December 5.
"When Pelé scored the fifth goal in that final, I have to be honest and say I felt like applauding," said Sweden's Sigvard Parling.
For Pelé, the standout memory from the tournament was putting his country on the sporting map.
"When we won the World Cup, everybody knew about Brazil," he told CNN's Don Riddell in 2016. "I think this was the most important thing I gave to my country because we were well known after that World Cup."
Another World Cup victory came in 1962, although an injury sidelined Pelé for the tournament's later stages. Further injuries hampered his next campaign in 1966 as Brazil exited the competition after the group stage, but redemption came in 1970.
"Pelé was saying that we were going to win, and if Pelé was saying that, then we were going to win the World Cup," Brazil's co-captain Carlos Alberto said about the tournament.
That team -- featuring the likes of Jairzinho, Gerson, Tostão, Rivellino, and, of course, Pelé -- is regarded as one of the greatest ever assembled.
11 World Cup greats — as you've never seen them before
In the final -- a 4-1 victory against Italy -- Brazil scored arguably the most famous World Cup goal of all time, a sweeping, length-of-the-pitch move involving nine of the team's 10 outfield players.
It ended with Pelé teeing up Alberto, who drilled the ball into the bottom corner of the net. Brazil's mantra of jogo bonito (the beautiful game) has never been better encapsulated.
Pelé, who had considered retiring before the 1970 World Cup, scored a goal of his own in the final and a total of four over the course of the tournament.
"Before the match, I told myself that Pelé was just flesh and bones like the rest of us," Italian defender Tarcisio Burgnich said after his side's defeat in the final. "Later, I realized I'd been wrong."
The tournament capped Pelé's World Cup career but not his time in the spotlight. In 1975, he signed a $1.67-million-a-year contract in the United States with the New York Cosmos.
One of the greatest players
With his larger-than-life personality and extraordinary dribbling skills -- a trademark of his game -- Pele's helped the Cosmos win the North American Soccer League championship in 1977 before officially retiring from football.
The league, which attracted further big names like Giorgio Chinaglia and Franz Beckenbauer, wouldn't last, ultimately folding in 1984. But around the world, Pelé's influence endured.
He remained in the public eye through endorsement deals and as an outspoken political voice who championed the poor in Brazil. He served as a Goodwill UNICEF ambassador for many years, promoting peace and support for vulnerable children.
Health problems persisted for much of Pelé's later life. He got around with the support of a walker -- an item he was filmed shoving around with disdain in a documentary released last year -- and in September 2021, he underwent surgery to remove a tumor from his right colon.
Paris Saint-Germain and France national football team forward Kylian Mbappe (R) and Brazilian football legend Pele take part in a meeting at the Hotel Lutetia in Paris on April 2, 2019.
Pelé's cancer treatment continued over the past year. He was hospitalized in Sao Paulo in November as the 2022 World Cup was being played in Qatar, prompting an outpouring of support from the global soccer community and beyond.
Debate will inevitably rage about whether Pelé is the greatest player of all time -- whether it is possible to compare Pelé's achievements to those of Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi, who have rewritten soccer's record books over the past 15 years, or to Diego Maradona, the late Argentinian star who captivated the footballing world in the 1980s and 90s.
In 2000, FIFA jointly named Maradona and Pelé as Player of the Century, but to some, the outright winner of the award should have been obvious.
"This debate about the player of the century is absurd," said Zico, who represented Brazil in the decade after Pelé's retirement. "There's only one possible answer: Pelé. He's the greatest player of all time, and by some distance, I might add."
Before Christmas, Pele's daughter posted a moving photo with father in hospital.
Exactly how many goals Pelé scored during his career is unclear, and his Guinness World Records tally has come under scrutiny with many scored in unofficial matches.
In March 2021, he congratulated Portugal's Ronaldo for passing his "record of goals in official matches" -- 767.
There is little doubt, however, that Pelé was, and always will be, football's first global superstar.
"If I pass away one day, I am happy because I tried to do my best," he told The Talks online magazine. "My sport allowed me to do so much because it's the biggest sport in the world."
Pele stats:
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| King Pele |
The man known as The King in Brazil accumulated a remarkable scoring record and haul of honours to his name over his career.
Brazil legend Pele was widely regarded as one of the best footballers of all time, having excelled on the national and world stage for over a decade. The three-time World Cup winner died on Thursday, December 29, from colon cancer complications.
A prolific goalscorer for Santos and his national team, he will forever remain part of a greatest of all time conversation which has expanded to include exceptional talents such as Diego Maradona, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.
How many goals did Pele score in his career?
The exact number of goals Pele scored in his career is a matter of dispute and figures vary, but he is reported to have found the net over 1,000 times.
According to FIFA's official website, Pele scored 1,281 goals in 1,363 games, but it must be noted that this figure includes data from a significant number of unofficial matches, such as friendly tours with Santos and the New York Cosmos. Guinness World Records, meanwhile, state that Pele scored 1,289 times in 1,363 matches.
The bulk of Pele's goals were scored for Santos, where he spent the majority of his career. He scored 643 goals for Santos in 656 competitive appearances. He netted 64 strikes in 107 games for the New York Cosmos.
The Rec Sport Soccer Statistics Foundation (RSSSF) reported that Pele's official goal tally - based on competitive matches only - was 767 goals in 831 games, though their overall (including unofficial games) tally varies from the others too, putting the Brazilian at 1,284 strikes in 1,375 fixtures.
How many goals did Pele score for Brazil?
Caps: 92 Goals: 77
Pele scored 77 goals for Brazil in 92 appearances. He is the joint-top goalscorer of all time for Brazil, alongside modern superstar Neymar, who matched his tally at the 2022 World Cup.
He scored his first goal for his country in 1957 in a 2-1 defeat against Argentina in Rio de Janeiro and continued to find the net regularly through the late 1950s, 1960s and into the 1970s.
Of Pele's 77 goals, 12 were scored in World Cups, with his biggest tally for a single tournament being six in the successful 1958 campaign.
His last goal for Brazil came in a 1971 friendly match against Austria in Sao Paulo, which ended 1-1.
How many World Cups did Pele win?
Pele played at four World Cups and was part of three winning Brazil teams: in 1958, 1962 and 1970.
The striker exploded onto the scene at the 1958 World Cup in Sweden, playing a pivotal role as the Selecao clinched their first ever world title.
Brazil won the World Cup again in 1962 in Chile, but Pele's influence at that tournament was unfortunately limited due to an injury sustained early in the campaign.
They could not defend their title at the 1966 World Cup as hosts England sealed glory, but reclaimed the crown in 1970, with Pele - an elder statesman among a cast of exciting stars - winning the Golden Ball.
Trophies Pele won with New York Cosmos
As well as three World Cups with Brazil, Pele was highly successful with Santos during his career.
Playing in what is sometimes referred to as a Golden Generation at the club, Pele won six Campeonato Brasileiro Serie A titles and two Copas Libertadores.
Domestic glory also came in the Campeonato Paulista - Sao Paulo's state championship - with Pele collecting 10 winners medals in that competition, as well as four Torneio Rio-Sao Paulo triumphs.
Having already won the World Cup with Brazil, he became a world champion at club level as Santos defeated Benfica to win the Intercontinental Cup in 1962, repeating the feat the following year against AC Milan.
In addition to two Intercontinental Cups, Pele's Santos won the short-lived Intercontinental Supercup in 1968.
In the closing stages of his career, Pele won the North American Soccer League Atlantic Conference and the North American Soccer League Soccer Bowl - both in 1977.
Interestingly, Pele never won a Copa America (or, as it was known then, the South American Championship), with Argentina and Uruguay dominating the tournament during his playing days.
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