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Born into poverty – he used to kick a grapevine around Brazil’s Minas Gerais state – skin Ended his career as arguably the greatest football player of all time.
That was that rarity; Like Muhammad Ali, Pele was a sports star who transcended his sport.
Brazilians brought joy and creativity to a sport that often gets bogged down in rigidity and individuality the beautiful game – “the beautiful game.”
“Pele changed everything,” wrote current Brazil international Neymar Jr. after the announcement of Pele’s death.
“He turned football into art, into entertainment. He gave a voice to the poor, black people, and especially. He gave visibility to Brazil.
From dazzling on the way to his first World Cup success as a 17-year-old in 1958 to claiming the Golden Ball award as player of the 1970 World Cup as he won a third global title,”King” (“The King”) achieved almost everything possible in Brazil’s famous yellow and blue.
And there were targets – lots of them.
Pelé scored 757 goals in 812 official matches for club and country. However, there is disagreement as to how many goals he scored in his career. According to Reuters, The Brazilian Football Federation and Santos state that Pelé scored 1,283 goals in 1,367 matches, although FIFA scores 1,281 goals in 1,366 games.
But it was not the phenomenal number of goals he scored. As Neymar suggests, Pele was also a performer on the pitch.
“Even though he didn’t use a brush or a pen, he had the ball at his feet,” says Don Riddell of CNN Sport.
The world first got a glimpse of Pele at the 1958 World Cup.
“When we arrived in Sweden, nobody knew what Brazil was. They knew about Argentina… Uruguay. It was a surprise to us,” Pele told CNN in 2016.
At the age of 17 years and seven months, Pelé became the youngest person to play in the World Cup, a record Brazil held until Norman Whiteside of Northern Ireland achieved that landmark in 1982. .
Almost 15 years after his world captaincy at the 1958 World Cup, Pele hung up his boots for the World Cup. selectionLeaving his country a legacy as the most successful team in World Cup history and the most feared team in international football.
Pelé’s crowning moment for Brazil came at the 1970 World Cup in Mexico, a tournament romanticized as the first World Cup to be broadcast in colour.
Throughout the tournament, Pelé dazzled in technicolor splendor, a blur of yellow and gold, enchanting and mesmerizing opposing teams.
His four goals earned him Player of the Tournament, assisted by Carlos Alberto’s breathtaking goal in the final against Italy.
“We won the World Cup, and I think (that was the pinnacle) in my life in sport, there’s no doubt about it,” Pele Said CNN.
Italian defender Tarcisio Bergnik aptly summed up Pelé’s superhuman talent: “I told myself before the game, he’s made of skin and bones, just like everyone else. But I was wrong.”
Even the moments when Pelé did not score helped cement his legend status – notably England goalkeeper Gordon Banks’ incredible block of a powerful header from Brazil in a group game, which was widely celebrated as It is considered to be the greatest defense of all time.
Pele wrote, “The save was one of the best I have ever seen – both in real life and among the thousands of games I have seen since.” in a 2019 Facebook post Tributes to Banks following the goalkeeper’s death.
“When you’re a football player, you know immediately how well you’ve hit the ball. I hit that header exactly as I expected. Exactly where I wanted it to go. And I was ready to celebrate.
“But then this guy, Banks, appeared in my vision like a kind of blue apparition.”
Despite playing all but three years of his club career with Brazilian side Santos, Pelé’s dynamism, majesty with the ball and lethality in front of goal ensured that he became one of football’s first black global stars.
Pelé admitted to CNN in 2015 that he had considerable interest from Europe to move across the Atlantic, but chose not out of loyalty and “love” for Santos; There is another reason why he is so beloved in his native country.
“In the past, it was a profession filled with love, now it is just a profession,” Pele Said,
“That love of playing for my club, playing for my country is not there. Clearly, a footballer needs to make a living from the game. It’s different from my time.
Such was his influence as a soccer player, that according to a recent Netflix documentary, Pele even became a symbol of a new country.
“To deal with that, I think he creates this Pele character, someone who essentially almost forgets his identity to become a Brazilian,” said Ben Nicolas, co-director of documentaries about Brazilian life. -Director, told CNN,
As well as carrying the weight of a country’s aspirations on the world stage, the rise of the Brazilian military in 1964 fueled interest in football as a strategic and political strategy – in particular, the 1970 World Cup was treated as a “state issue”. Targeting in form – presented a problem for the apolitical Pele, according to the Netflix documentary.
David Treyhorn, the documentary’s second director, said, “There’s a very impressive line at the end of the film.” Said“Where you’re expecting Pele to give us maybe a ‘Pele-ism’ where he’ll talk about joy and happiness, but he’ll actually talk about ‘relief.'”
Football’s GOAT debate is one that will continue until the end of time – is it Pele? or is it diego maradona, Or Lionel Messi Or Cristiano Ronaldo?
But, Brazil’s pure love and adoration for Pele has no equal and is one that extends far beyond just an outstanding footballer, but to a totem pole for a nation.