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Pele, who led Brazil to three World Cup titles, died of cancer at the age of 82.
In his 21-year career, he scored 1281 goals in 1363 games, setting a world record. These include playing 92 games for the Brazil national team and scoring 77 goals.
Pele is the only player to win three World Cups in 1958, 1962 and 1970. He was named FIFA Player of the Century in 2000.
Bailey, who has suffered from colon cancer in recent years, will have his health deteriorate in 2022. His cancer cells have spread to his lungs and liver.
And during the 2022 World Cup, he entered the hospital for the last time and still affects the hearts of millions of people inside and outside the football world. This is because of his lofty status in this global sport.
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In 2022, Bailey still touches the hearts of millions of fans
England football legend Bobby Charlton (Bobby Charlton, Bobby Charlton) once said that football seems to be “invented for Pele”. Most ball critics believe that he is the most perfect embodiment of this “beautiful game”.
Pele possessed superb technique and lightning speed, paired with deadly precision in front of goal.
In his native Brazil, he is a national hero; around the world, he is a sports icon.
Beyond that, off the pitch, he worked tirelessly on advocacy to improve the lives of the most vulnerable in society.
boy turned out
Pele was originally named Edson Arantes do Nascimento (Edson Arantes do Nascimento) and was born on October 23, 1940 in Tres Coracoes, a city in southeastern Brazil.
The date of birth listed on his birth certificate is October 21, but Pele has always insisted that is wrong: “In Brazil, we don’t have that high a requirement for accuracy.”
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In 1960, Pele represented Brazil in the game
His name “Edson” comes from inventor Thomas Alva Edison. According to Bailey, this is because electricity had only just been connected to his hometown shortly before he was born.
Afterwards, his parents dropped the letter “i” from his name.
He grew up in a poor family in the southeastern city of Bauru. He had to work part-time at a local coffee shop to help make ends meet.
His father taught him to play football, but his family couldn’t afford a football – so the young Pele often used socks rolled into a cloth ball as a ball in the streets and alleys.
“Bailey”
At school, he was nicknamed “Pele” by his friends for the first time, although neither he nor his friends knew what the nickname meant.
He had always disliked the nickname, thinking it sounded like “baby cavity” in Portuguese.
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Pele has deadly precision in front of goal
As a teenager, he started playing in some local amateur teams.
Indoor football was just emerging in his area and the young Pele enjoyed playing on a different surface.
“I was like a duck to water with it,” he would later say. “It was faster than a soccer ball on grass—you had to think really fast.”
He rose to prominence by leading the Bauru Athletic Club’s junior team to three state junior championships, and was considered a prodigy.
In 1956, his coach Waldemar de Brito (Waldemar de Brito) took him to the port city of Santos to try out for the professional team Santos Club (Santos FC, Santos).
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Pele playing for Santos (Santos)
At that time, De Brito was very confident in the ability of his favorite student. He bragged to the Santos directors that Pele would be the best player in the world.
Bailey’s later performance was not at all ashamed of this kind of praise. The Santos team was conquered by him and gave him a professional contract. It was June 1956, and Bailey was 15 years old.
marksman
A year later, he was called up to Santos’ senior team, scoring a goal in his first game and starting a prolific goal-scoring career.
He quickly earned a regular spot on the team and was the league’s top scorer in his first year.
Just 10 months after signing as a professional player, Pele received a call-up to the Brazil national team.
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Pele was underage when he made his debut for Brazil
He represented the national team for the first time at the Maracana Stadium (Maracana, Maracana Stadium) against Argentina, Brazil lost 1-2.
Their goal in that game was scored by 16-year-old Pele, who became the youngest player to score for the national team.
His hopes of representing Brazil in the 1958 World Cup were nearly dashed when he suffered a knee injury.
But his teammates put pressure on the team management to ask the national team to select him in the squad. Later, he played against the USSR in his first World Cup game.
hat trick
Naturally, he also became the youngest player to score at the World Cup, when he scored against Wales in the semi-finals.
In the semi-finals, after Brazil led France 2-1 in the second half, Pelé scored a three-goal hat-trick to put an end to the game’s suspense.
In the final against Sweden, Pele seemed to have nothing to lose. He scored two more goals to help Brazil win 5-2.
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In the 1958 World Cup final, Pele won the Swedish goalkeeper when he took off for a header
Back in Brazil, Pele helped Santos beat Sao Paulo in the domestic top league in 1958, and he also became the season’s top scorer.
In 1962, there was a famous game in which Santos beat European champions Benfica (Benfica). Pelé scored a hat-trick in Lisbon to crush the Portuguese champions, convincing rival goalkeeper Costa Pereira.
“I was hoping to come here and stop a great guy,” Pereira said, “but in the end I gave in and I was beaten by a guy who was born on another planet.”
National treasure
However, the 1962 World Cup, although it ended with Brazil’s successful title defense, was accompanied by disappointment for Pele. A serious injury in one game early in the season ruled him out for the rest of the season.
However, that did not stop wealthy clubs such as Manchester United and Real Madrid from scrambling to sign a man who was considered the best player in the world at the time.
Thinking that their superstar might be poached overseas, the Brazilian government hurriedly declared Pele a “national treasure” to prevent him from transferring abroad.
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In 1969, Bailey scored the 1,000th goal of his career, and he was lifted by his teammates after the game
The 1966 World Cup was an even bigger disappointment for Pele and Brazil. Pele became the target of public criticism on the pitch and was constantly fouled by opponents, especially against Portugal and Bulgaria.
Brazil were knocked out in the first period and Pele was not able to perform at his best after a series of violent tackles followed by an injury.
Back in Brazil, the Santos team also began a period of decline, and Pele’s contribution to the team also began to decrease.
greatest team
In 1969, Pele was nearly 30 years old, and at first he was unwilling to continue to represent Brazil in the 1970 World Cup in Mexico.
At the time, he was also under investigation by the domestic military dictatorship, who was suspected of having pro-leftist political stances.
But in the end, he represented Brazil in the World Cup for the last time and scored four goals. This Brazilian team is also considered the best team in history.
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England keeper Banksy blocks Pele’s goal as ‘save of the century’
The famous scene of this competition appeared in the group match between Brazil and England. Bailey’s header in the penalty area was bound to go in, but it was saved by England goalkeeper Gordon Banks (Gordon Banks) in front of the goal line. “Century save”.
Even so, Brazil advanced all the way and beat Italy 4-1 in the final.
Pele scored one goal and assisted two in that final as Brazil became the first team to win three World Cups.
The Italian defender Tarcisio Burgnich (Tarcisio Burgnich, Bailizhi), who was in charge of marking Pele in that game, commented on Pele after the game: “Before the game, I said to myself: ‘He is a man of flesh and blood. body, like everyone else.’ But I was wrong.”
According to the rules established at the time, the three-time champion Brazil permanently retained the Jules Rimet trophy named after the founder of the World Cup.
His last match for Brazil was against Yugoslavia in Rio de Janeiro on July 18, 1971. He retired from domestic football in 1974 and no longer plays for Brazilian clubs.
Two years later, he signed with the New York Cosmos. Although past his prime, Pele’s name has still greatly contributed to the popularity of football in the United States.
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Pele hoisted the Remy Gold Cup in 1970, the year Brazil retained the trophy permanently
PR ambassador and global business card
In 1977, Pele, who was about to end his playing career, launched a global tour with the New York Cosmos, and his “football public relations” also extended to distant China.
In September of that year, the Cosmos team and the Chinese national team staged a friendly match in Beijing and Shanghai, allowing the Chinese people who are about to usher in the era of reform and opening up to witness the demeanor of the football king.
The former international footballer Liu Lifu, who played and scored a goal on behalf of the Chinese team in the game, recalled in an interview with BBC Chinese in 2018: “I was a frog at the bottom of the well…the outside (world) didn’t know at all” , but playing with Bailey opened his eyes.
After returning to the United States, the Cosmos played a friendly match with Pele’s old club Brazil Santos at the Giants Stadium in New Jersey as Pele’s farewell match. Bailey played half-time for both teams in a packed game.
Throughout his career, Pele scored more than 1,200 goals.
Before retiring, he was the highest paid athlete in the world; after retiring, he is still a powerful money machine.
He cameoed as an actor, appearing on the big screen alongside Sylvester Stallone and Michael Caine (Michael Caine) in the 1981 film Escape to Victory.
He has had a fair amount of sponsorship and endorsement deals, and his name still has a strong appeal around the world.
In 1992, he was appointed UN Ambassador for Ecology and the Environment and later became a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador.
Five years later, he was awarded the Knight Commander of the British Empire at Buckingham Palace.
After being appointed by then-President Fernando Henrique Cardoso as Brazil’s sports minister in 1995, Pele took a leading role in Brazil’s football anti-corruption drive. In 1998, Brazil passed the “Pele’s Law”, which was considered an important step in the modernization of football management in the country.
However, he was later accused of corruption himself and subsequently resigned from UNESCO. However, the allegations have never been proven.
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Bailey in the 1981 film “The Great Escape”
He also played a key role in the bidding process for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games and was featured in the handover ceremony at the closing ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games.
In 2005, he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award at BBC Sports Personality of the Year.
Throughout his life, even people with no interest and knowledge of football knew his name.
He once joked that there are only three truly international brands: Jesus, Coca-Cola and Pele.
The media is always chasing him for a few words, and he is always generous with his thoughtless comments and predictions, even if he is a famous “crow mouth”.
The two most well-known predictions are that African countries will win the World Cup before the advent of the 21st century, and Colombia will win the 1994 World Cup-Colombia was eliminated in the group stage that year, and African countries have never entered World Cup final.
“I think my track record in this sport gives me the right to speak my mind.” Pele told Fernando Duarte, a BBC Brazilian reporter who interviewed him many times in 2006. ) said so.
He is one of the very few people who has elevated the sport he played into something the world knows.
The late famous American modern artist Andy Warhol (Andy Warhol) once said that Bailey was one of the very few people who violated his “fame theory”: “His fame does not last for 15 minutes, but will last for 15 century.”
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Brazil players hold up a banner to pay tribute to Pele in hospital after defeating South Korea in the round of 16 during the World Cup in Qatar
“Three Hearts”
Bailey married Rosemeri dos Reis Cholbi in 1966 and they have two daughters and a son. The couple divorced in 1982 after Bailey was accused of having an affair with model and actress Xuxa.
Bailey’s second marriage was to singer Assiria Lemos Seixas. They had twins but then ended up breaking up.
In 2016, he married Japanese-Brazilian businessman Marcia Cibele Aoki. They have known each other since the 1980s.
Bailey’s personal life and family have not been short of controversies – his son Edson has been arrested for involvement in drug trafficking, and Bailey has refused to admit that a woman named Sandra (Sandra) was his father in the 1960s. A daughter born in an affair.
In a Netflix documentary in 2022, Bailey admitted that he has had so many affairs, “I don’t even know how many children I have had.”
In recent years, Bailey has often been plagued by health problems. In September 2021, he underwent colon tumor removal surgery.
Still, he tackles challenges with his usual good humor. Before being admitted to the hospital in November 2022, he joked in an Instagram post that he was preparing for a “monthly visit” to the hospital.
During the 2022 World Cup, there was news that Pele was critically ill. A building in host country Qatar was lit and lined with the words: “Get Well Soon, Pele.”
Bailey expressed his gratitude to the Qatar World Cup organizers for this, and still posted posts on social media in the ward, praising Neymar (Neymar, Neymar) and Mbappe (Kylian Mbappe, McGregor) for their outstanding performance in the World Cup. Barbie) and Messi (Lionel Messi).
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Nelson Mandela summed up what it was like to watch Pele play brilliantly
In his later years, Bailey has been unable to get rid of the impact of hip surgery: he often cannot walk, but appears in front of the world in a wheelchair.
However, the old ball king always remains positive and optimistic. Fernando Duarte recalls how the Old Bailey once said to him, when talking about his physical condition: “Did you forget that the place where I was born was called ‘Tres Coracoes’?” In Portuguese, That’s what “three hearts” means.
“It’s hard to bring down someone who has ‘three dirty things,'” Bailey said with a laugh at the time.
Today, Pele’s life has come to an end, but in his prime, his game brought joy to millions: his natural talent won the respect of teammates and opponents alike.
Hungarian great Ferenc Puskas (Puskas) is not even willing to define Pele as just a player. “Pelé went above and beyond that,” he said.
And perhaps the best description of Pele’s stardom comes from Nelson Mandela.
“Watching him play is like seeing the joy of a child and the charisma of a man at the same time.”