KEIR RADNEDGE COMMENTARY —- Pele, the footballer whose talent and personality transcended his sport like no other, has died in hospital in Sao Paulo, aged 82. Brazil has declared three days or mourning for the nation’s greatest sporting superstar ahead of his funeral on Tuesday.

World federation FIFA has asked all of football to observe a one-minute silence in Pele’s memory and honour before weekend matches and over the next days.

Edson Arantes di Nascimento scored 1,281 goals in 1,363 appearances during a 21-year career, including 77 goals in 92 matches for Brazil with whom he became the only player to win the World Cup three times. He was a champion in 1958, 1962 and 1970 though he missed the 1962 final through injury.

His health had been fading for much of the last decade with recent years bringing kidney and prostate problems. He underwent surgery at the Albert Einstein Hospital in Sao Paulo to remove a colon tumour in September 2021 and was readmitted in late November 2022.

Brazilian fans and players at the World Cup finals in Qatar sent him a stream of well-wishing messages while his daughter Kely Nascimento kept fans updated on her father’s condition with regular social media updates.

On Thursday she posted a picture of what appeared to be Pele’s family’s hands on his body in hospital and wrote: “Everything we are is thanks to you. We love you infinitely. Rest in peace.”

The hospital confirmed that Pele died “due to the failure of multiple organs, a result of the progression of colon cancer associated with his previous clinical condition.”

That name

Most Brazilian footballers are known by nicknames. Pele does not know the origin of his own tag. He recalled only that he did not like it and was in trouble at school for fighting with class-mates who called him Pele. Later, of course, it became the most familiar name in world sport.

Pele’s teenage exploits as a player with his local club, Bauru, earned him a transfer to Santos at the age of 15. Rapidly he earned national and then international recognition.

At 16 he was playing for Brazil; at 17 he was winning the World Cup. Yet it took pressure from his team-mates to persuade national manager Vicente Feola to throw him into the action in Sweden in 1958.

Santos were not slow to recognize the potential offered their club by Pele. The directors created a sort of circus, touring the world, playing two and three times a week for lucrative match fees. The income from this gave the club the financial leverage to buy a supporting cast which helped turn Santos into World Club Champions in 1962 and 1963.

The pressure on Pele was reflected in injuries, one of which restricted him to only a peripheral role at the 1962 World Cup finals. He scored a marvellous solo goal against Mexico in the first round, but pulled a muscle and missed the rest of the tournament. Brazil, even without him, went on to retain the Jules Rimet Trophy.

In 1966 Pele led Brazil in England. But referees were unprepared to give players of skill and creativity the necessary protection.

Saddest image

One of the saddest images of the tournament was Pele, a raincoat around his shoulders, leaving the pitch after being kicked out of the tournament by Portugal. Brazil, this time, did not possess the same strength in depth as in 1962, and crashed out.

Four years later Pele took his revenge in the most glorious way. As long as the game is played, the 1970 World Cup finals will be revered as the apotheosis of a great player, not only at his very best, but achieving the rewards his talent deserved.

As a 17-year-old Pele had scored one of the unforgettable World Cup goals in the Final against Sweden – in 1970 he twice nearly surpassed it. First, against Czechoslovakia, he just missed scoring with a shot from his own half of the field, and against Uruguay he sold an outrageous dummy to the goalkeeper and just missed again.

It says everything about Pele’s transcending genius that he was the one man able to set light to soccer in the United States in the 1970s. Although the North American Soccer League eventually collapsed amid financial confusion, soccer was by that stage firmly established as a grass-roots American sport.

Without Pele’s original allure that could never have happened and the capture of host rights for the 1994 finals would never have been possible.

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