Pelé
Inside Forward / Centre-Forward · Santos FC · Brazil
About Pelé
Edson Arantes do Nascimento — universally known as Pelé — is the only player in history to win three FIFA World Cups (1958, 1962, 1970). He scored over 1,000 career goals, was declared a national treasure of Brazil, and is co-holder of the FIFA Player of the Century award alongside Diego Maradona.
Pelé's story
Born into Nothing
Edson Arantes do Nascimento was born on 23 October 1940 in Três Corações, a small town in Minas Gerais, Brazil. His family was desperately poor — his father Dondinho, a footballer himself, earned almost nothing. As a child, Pelé could not afford proper boots and practised with a grapefruit or a sock stuffed with rags tied with string. He shined shoes outside the local café to help the family. Despite this, he was a joyful, mischievous child — his mother called him Dico; the nickname Pelé grew out of his own childhood mispronunciation of Bilé, a goalkeeper his father had played alongside, and he hated it as a boy, getting into fights over it at school.
Santos & Stardom
Spotted by Waldemar de Brito — a former Brazil international — Pelé joined Santos (BRA) at 15. By 16 he was the top scorer in the São Paulo state league. At 17 he was on the plane to the 1958 World Cup. He wept openly on the pitch after Brazil won the final, and the television pictures of a sobbing teenager held by his teammates are among the most iconic in football history. The Brazilian government declared him a national treasure to prevent European clubs from buying him.
Family & Faith
Pelé was married three times. His first wife, Rosemeri dos Reis Cholbi, was his childhood sweetheart. They married in 1966 and had three children: Kely, Edinho and Jennifer. The marriage ended in 1982. He later married gospel singer Assíria Seixas (1994–2008), with whom he had twins Joshua and Celeste in 1996. His third wife was businesswoman Márcia Aoki, whom he married in 2016 and who was at his side when he died. Pelé was a deeply religious man — he credited God for his gifts and was known for his warmth and humility. He fathered seven children in all, and acknowledged a daughter, Sandra, born from an extramarital relationship, only after a lengthy legal battle.
Health & Decline
In his later years Pelé's health declined significantly. He had a hip replacement, suffered from kidney and prostate problems, and struggled with depression after leaving the public eye. His son Edinho spent time in prison in Brazil on drug-related charges, a source of enormous private pain. When Pelé was hospitalised in late 2022, the world watched and waited. He died peacefully on 29 December 2022, aged 82, surrounded by his family. Brazil declared three days of national mourning.
The Number
Pelé had a complex relationship with his own legend. He was generous, charitable and genuinely beloved, but also acknowledged he found it impossible to live a normal life. "I was born to play football," he once said, "just as Beethoven was born to write music." Guinness World Records credits him with 1,279 goals in 1,363 games, friendlies included; Pelé's own count was 1,283. Official or not, it remains one of sport's most astonishing individual tallies.
Did you know?
- 🔟 He wore the number 10 by accident. Brazil's federation failed to submit squad numbers for the 1958 World Cup, so a FIFA committee member, Uruguayan Lorenzo Villizzio, handed them out with no system at all. The 17-year-old reserve got 10, and the shirt has carried his aura ever since.
- 🎬 He played the POW striker Luis Fernandez in the 1981 film Escape to Victory alongside Sylvester Stallone, Michael Caine and Bobby Moore, and scored the film's climactic bicycle kick himself, reportedly in a single take.
- 👨👩👧👦 Father of seven children across three marriages and two other relationships, among them Edinho, a former Santos goalkeeper who later coached in Brazil's lower leagues. He made his home in Guarujá, on the São Paulo coast across the water from Santos, and is buried in the city's Memorial Necrópole Ecumênica, a vertical cemetery overlooking the Vila Belmiro.
- 👶 Scored in the 1958 World Cup final aged 17 years and 249 days, still the youngest scorer in a World Cup final, having already hit a hat-trick against France in the semi-final five days earlier. He remains the youngest player ever to win the tournament.
- 👕 During a rare mid-1960s slump at Santos he decided the cause was a 'lucky' shirt he had given to a fan, and hired a detective to get it back. The shirt returned a week later and his form with it. Years afterwards he learned the detective had simply handed him a shirt from a previous match.
- 🎸 He composed more than 100 songs. His recording debut was a 1969 duet album with Elis Regina, he cut an album with Sérgio Mendes in 1977, and his 2006 record Pelé Ginga featured Gilberto Gil. Much of it was written on a guitar in Santos hotel rooms.
- 📛 His real name is Edson Arantes do Nascimento, named after the inventor Thomas Edison. His parents dropped the 'i', but a clerical slip on his birth certificate meant many documents still read 'Edison'.
- ⚽ His 1,000th goal came from the penalty spot against Vasco da Gama at the Maracanã on 19 November 1969. Mobbed by fans and reporters, he dedicated it to the poor children of Brazil. 19 November is now Pelé Day in the state of São Paulo.
- 🤝 He was a UN ambassador for ecology and the environment from 1992 and a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador from 1994. In June 2016 he auctioned more than 1,600 items of memorabilia at Julien's in London, with the replica Jules Rimet trophy alone fetching £320,000, and in 2018 launched the Pelé Foundation to fight child poverty through education and clean water.
Honours
- FIFA World Cup x3: 1958, 1962, 1970 — Brazil
- Copa Libertadores x2: 1962, 1963 — Santos FC
- Intercontinental Cup x2: 1962, 1963 — Santos FC
- Campeonato Paulista x10: 1958–1973 — Santos FC
- Brazilian championship (Taça Brasil / Roberto Gomes Pedrosa) x6: 1961–1965, 1968 — Santos FC
- NASL Soccer Bowl: 1977 — New York Cosmos
- FIFA Player of the Century: 2000 — jointly with Diego Maradona
- World Cup Golden Ball: 1970 — best player of the tournament
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