Pele dies at 82

cemetery, where he will be buried in a private ceremony.

‘WHAT IS POSSIBLE’ US President Joe Biden said on his Twitter that Pele’s rise from humble beginnings to soccer legend was a story of “what is possible”.

Pele, whose given name was Edson Arantes do Nascimento, joined Santos in 1956 and turned the small coastal club into one of the most famous names in football.

In addition to a host of regional and national titles, Pele won two Copa Libertadores, the South American equivalent of the Champions League, and two Intercontinental Cups, the annual tournament held between the best teams in Europe and South America.

He took home three World Cup winner’s medals, the first time as a 17-year-old in Sweden in 1958, the second in Chile four years later — even though he missed most of the tournament through injury — and the third in Mexico in 1970, when he led what is considered to be one of the greatest sides ever to play the game.

He retired from Santos in 1974 but a year later made a surprise comeback by signing a lucrative deal to join the New York Cosmos in the then nascent North American Soccer League.

In a glorious 21-year career he scored between 1281 and 1283 goals, depending on how matches are counted.

Pele, though, transcended soccer, like no player before or since, and he became one of the first global icons of the 20th century.

With his winning smile and an aw-shucks humility that charmed legions of fans, he was better known than many Hollywood stars, popes or presidents — many if not most of whom he met during a sixdecade-long career as player and corporate pitchman.

“I am sad, but I am also proud to be Brazilian, to be from Pele’s country, a guy who was a great athlete,” said Ciro Campos, a 49-year-old biologist in Rio de Janeiro. “And also off the field, he was a cool person, not an arrogant athlete.”

Pele credited his one-of-a-kind mix of talent, creative genius and technical skill to a youth spent playing pick-up games in smalltown Brazil, often using grapefruit or wadded-up rags because his family could not afford a real ball.

Pele was named “Athlete of the Century” by the International Olympic Committee, “co-Football Player of the Century” by world soccer body FIFA, and a “national treasure” by Brazil’s government.

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