As the 2026 World Cup begins on June 14, 2026, it is nice to remember one of the legends who brought the attention of the whole world to the game of football.
Edson Arantes do Nascimento better known as Pelé, took world football by its neck from a very young age and won the World Cup three times starting in 1958 when he was just a kid who was extremely a brilliant football player.
Pelé began playing for Brazilian football club Santos at age 15, and for the Brazil national team at 16. During his international career, he won three FIFA World Cup titles – in 1958, 1962, and 1970 – becoming the only player to do so and the youngest to win a World Cup, at just 17 years old.
He was nicknamed O Rei (The King) following the 1958 World Cup. With 77 goals in 92 games for Brazil, Pelé held the record as the national team’s top goalscorer for over fifty years.
According to Pelé, the gameplay of futsal was much quicker than football on grass, and players had to think faster because everyone was close to each other on the pitch. He credits futsal for helping him think better on the spot. In addition, futsal allowed him to play with adults when he was about 14 years old.
In one of the tournaments he played in, he was initially considered too young to play, but ultimately became the top scorer with 14 or 15 goals. “That gave me a lot of confidence”, Pelé said. “I knew then not to be afraid of whatever might come”. Pelé named Brazilian playmaker Zizinho among his inspirations growing up.
During the 1960 season, Pelé scored 34 goals as Santos regained the Campeonato Paulista trophy. During the 1961 season, Pelé scored 47 goals as his team won both the Campeonato Paulista and the Taça Brasil.
The Taça victory allowed Santos to participate in the Copa Libertadores, the most prestigious club tournament in the Western hemisphere.
In 1961, the government of Brazil under President Jânio Quadros declared Pelé an “official national treasure” to prevent him from being transferred out of the country.
Santos’s most successful Copa Libertadores season started in 1962. They defeated Universidad Católica in the semi-finals and triumphed 3–0 over defending champions Peñarol in the finals. Pelé scored twice in the final match and was the second top scorer of the competition with four goals.
That same year, Santos successfully defended the Campeonato Paulista with 37 goals from Pelé, as well as the Taça Brasil. Santos also won the 1962 Intercontinental Cup against Benfica. Pelé produced one of the best performances of his career, scoring a hat-trick in Lisbon as Santos won 5–2.
Following the match, Benfica goalkeeper Costa Pereira remarked, “I arrived hoping to stop a great man, but I went away convinced I had been undone by someone who was not born on the same planet as the rest of us.”.
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Pelé said his most memorable goal was scored against Clube Atlético Juventus on 2 August 1959. As there is no video footage of this match, Pelé asked that a computer animation be made of this specific goal.[43] In March 1961, Santos played against Fluminense at the Maracanã stadium.
Near the end of the first half, Pelé received the ball on the edge of his own penalty area, then ran the length of the field, eluding opposing players with feints, before striking the ball beyond the goalkeeper.
According to the newspaper O Globo, Pelé’s goal earned him a two-minute standing ovation from the crowd, including Fluminense fans.
Several days later, a plaque was mounted on the wall of the stadium with a dedication to “the most beautiful goal in the history of the Maracanã”. The goal became known as the gol de placa, “the goal of the plaque”. Over the years, this phrase found its way into Brazilian footballing vocabulary as a way to describe a remarkable goal worthy of commemoration.
As the defending champions, Santos qualified automatically to the semi-final stage of the 1963 Copa Libertadores. They overcame a Botafogo team that featured the Brazilian superstars Garrincha and Jairzinho, and with five goals from Pelé throughout the tournament, Santos claimed the title once again.
In another piece this is what we found out about Pele the world class footballer and our interests in football as Kenyans.
That story looks funny now, but we are getting ready for 2026 World Cup in less than two weeks from now.
Rest In Glory Legend Edson Arantes do Nascimento: Our Pele has left us. He will live with us forever
By Adongo Ogony December 29, 2022
President Barack Obama summed up the feelings of the world when he wrote down the following words in a tweet about the legend after he passed away in 2022.
” Pelé was one of the greatest to ever play the beautiful game. And as one of the most recognizable athletes in the world, he understood the power of sports to bring people together. Our thoughts are with his family and everyone who loved and admired him“
Those who first saw Pele playing as a teenage kid for his then team Santos of Brazil were just overwhelmed with his skill level at that age:
Here are the words of a German film director Werner Herzog when he saw him play in Munich in 1960.
“I immediately was mesmerized by this kid Pele, Santos won 9 to 1. They scored one after the other and I saw something like magic, a kid scoring one goal after the other and doing things on the field that I never thought would be possible. Pure, total magic. And it’s still with me.”
Pele joined the Brazilian national team at 17 years of age for a World Cup held in Sweden in 1958 and became the youngest human being to score a goal in the World Cup.
He was just a little boy having fun. He had no idea he was tearing the world of football to pieces. That goal at the World Cup in Sweden was one of the 1,281 goals he lived to score in the beautiful game for clubs and country until he retired in 1977.
Brazil went on to win the 1958 World Cup beating the home team Sweden with the then 17 year old kid as their hero in mid-field.
On June 29, 1958, Brazil defeats host nation Sweden 5-2 to win its first World Cup. Brazil came into the tournament as a favorite, and did not disappoint, thrilling the world with their spectacular play, which was often referred to as the “beautiful game.”
Nobody could believe that some 17 year old kid was terrorizing every other team in the World Cup and leading his team to win it all. It never happened before nor since. That was Pele in 1958.
And more was to come.
Pele was often a consistent and enduring player for his team and also liked to do spectacular things in the field for his team and for the fans and he truly has no equals in the game of football. The way he scored some people may think he was a striker or a forward with his No. 10 spot, but in reality Pele was a mid-fielder who comes at the other teams defense and everyone is shaking not knowing what he was up to.
From his first World Cup win in 1958, Pele went on to win three World Cup trophies for Brazil and FIFA gave Brazil the World Cup trophy to keep forever after they won it three times. And here is the football boss after Brazil took the World Cup in 1970. He threw everything at it.
At the diplomatic level in Africa Pele was at the fore front to resolve the Biafra War in Nigeria which could have split the continent in pieces.
Pele was at the centre of battle again for good.
In his home town Tres Caracoes in Minas state in Brazil they have a statute for him and that is just part of the love they have for him down there from when he was 16 years old and joined Santos team in Brazil and won dozens of trophies for the club.
And finally, Pele retired from football in 1977 after playing a game in New York playing for his team Cosmos in a stadium filled with over 75,000 fans. Pele joined Cosmos in 1975 at age 35 and still very good. For two years Pele was playing football in New York and all of a sudden the game started to attract fans and young Americans wanted to kick this thing called soccer. The rest is history.
Rest in Peace big guy. You are a gift to our universe that will keep giving. Thank you for hanging around this planet for 82 years and leaving us with memories that will last for centuries.
Rest in Peace legend and Greet your friend there for us. Tell him there are some people down here who need to be whacked in the mouth big time. For now we will do the whacking. Good company up there. We have friends there and that is good for us. You did your job. Now we have to do ours and we will.
On to the future:
