Brazilian Football Legend Pele Dies at 82 After Prolonged Battle With Cancer
Pele won three World Cup titles with Brazil, amid a plethora of other accolades.
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Brazilian football icon Pele passed away on Thursday, 29 December, at the age of 82. The three-time World Cup-winning player was undergoing colon cancer treatment since 2021 and was hospitalised at the Albert Einstein Israelite Hospital in Morumbi, Sao Paolo.
Pele’s death was confirmed by his daughter, Kely Nascimento, who wrote on Instagram “Everything we are is because of you. We love you infinitely. Rest in peace.”
Pele's death was confirmed by his daughter, Kely Nascimento.
(Photo: Instagram/iamkelynascimento)
The Man Who Became a Myth
Born Edson Arantes do Nascimento on 23 October 1940, Pele grew up in Tres Coracoes, a municipality in South-East Brazil. His father, Dodinho, was also a professional football. Pele started his career with Sao Paulo’s Bauru Athletic Clube when he was only 12 years of age.
At 15, he moved to Santos, and it proved to be the turning point in his career. A year later, he made his debut for the Brazil national football team, and soon established himself as one of the greatest talents the football-frenzied nation ever produced.
He won three World Cup titles with the Selecao – in 1958, 1962 and 1970. Having scored 77 goals in 92 games, he is the joint-highest goal-scorer for his nation. Besides that, he is also the youngest player to have ever won the World Cup and the only player to win three editions of the apex football competition.
Pele also is recognised by the Guinness Book of World Records as the leading goal-scorer of the game, with 1279 goals in 1363 games. At the club level, he also represented the United States of America’s New York Cosmos besides Brazil’s Santos.
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