Football legend Pele has passed away at the age of 82
The 82-year-old Pele, a legendary Brazilian football player who came from barefoot squalor to become one of the finest and most well-known athletes in contemporary history, passed away on Thursday. His daughter, Kely Nascimento, announced his death on Instagram. He was the only person to have won the World Cup three times as a player. Since having a colon tumor removed in September 2021, Pele has routinely had chemotherapy.
Additionally, he had trouble walking without assistance ever since a failed hip procedure in 2012. On the eve of the coronavirus pandemic in February 2020, his son Edinho claimed that Pele was depressed due to his declining physical condition. Pele, real name Edson Arantes do Nascimento, joined Santos in 1956 and helped make the little coastal team one of football’s most recognizable brands. In addition to winning many regional and national titles, he also won two Copa Libertadores, which is South America’s Champions League, and two Intercontinental Cups, which is an annual competition between the best teams from Europe and South America.
A inspiração e o amor marcaram a jornada de Rei Pelé, que faleceu no dia de hoje.
— Pelé (@Pele) December 29, 2022
Amor, amor e amor, para sempre.
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Inspiration and love marked the journey of King Pelé, who peacefully passed away today.
Love, love and love, forever. pic.twitter.com/CP9syIdL3i
He won three World Cup championship medals, the first when he was just 17 years old in 1958 in Sweden, the second in Chile four years later despite missing most of the competition due to injury, and the third in Mexico in 1970 when he captained one of the greatest teams in the history of the tournament. In 1974, he announced his retirement from Santos, but a year later, he made a stunning comeback by agreeing to a lucrative contract to play for the New York Cosmos in the fledgling North American Soccer League.
He scored 1,283 goals throughout an illustrious 21-year career. But unlike any other player before or since, Pele went beyond soccer and became one of the first 20th-century global icons. He was more well-known than many Hollywood stars, popes, or presidents thanks to his endearing grin and humble demeanor, which won him legions of admirers. He met many, if not most, of these people during his six-decade career as a player and corporate pitchman. He attributed his unique blend of talent, creative ingenuity, and technical aptitude to his time as a young man playing pick-up games in a small Brazilian town. Because his family could not buy a real ball, he frequently used grapefruit or wadded-up rags as a ball.
The International Olympic Committee dubbed Pele “Athlete of the Century,” FIFA awarded him co-“Football Player of the Century,” and the Brazilian government referred to him as a “national treasure.” His fame was often overpowering. In his company, grown adults frequently started bawling. When he was a player, souvenir-hungry spectators would frequently rush to the field after games and rip off his shorts, socks, and even underwear.
He lived less than a mile from the beach in Brazil, but for around 20 years he avoided going there out of fear of the crowds. Nonetheless, he rarely complains to friends in casual settings. He spoke movingly about how soccer allowed him to travel the world, cheer up cancer patients and survivors of war and famine, and provide for a family that, growing up, frequently did not know where their next meal would come from. He believed that his talent was a heavenly gift.
He stated to Reuters in 2013 that “God gave me this skill for one reason: to make people happy.” I made an effort to remember that, no matter what.
His greatest accomplishment was to popularize television in the pre-internet era, when it was the domain of the affluent, through his game. Footballing talents like the Italian-Argentine Luis Menoti, Ferenc Puskas of Hungary, José Leandro Andrade of Uruguay, and others existed before him. But no one was able to cover the sport as extensively as Pele did, from South Asia to the Far East to Australia and Latin America.
Few nations do not even have a player or a football club named after him. He was the first international football star, the supreme deity, the diva, and the don. He made the game more beautiful and glamorous. He was the ideal protagonist—a young man who rose from the gutter to the top. He had numerous advertising contracts well into his 70s, ranging from Coca-Cola and Viagra to Nokia and Mastercard.
In contrast to Maradona, Pele generally avoided scandal during his playing career. He was a Messi-like football player, faultless, and an example to follow. However, as he aged and after retiring, he did not always strum the right notes. His tight ties to the military regime, accusations that his sports management company stole money from UNICEF, and his unwillingness to acknowledge a daughter born out of wedlock all helped to chip away at some of his aura.
But in the end, they would serve as footnotes or defenses of the claim that he was human after all. His passing away today is further evidence that he was a human. However, it was Pele who passed away, not Edson Arantes do Nascimento or his mother’s “Dicho,” who was immortal and unstoppable.