On August 8, 1956, a shy and fragile 15-year-old boy arrived at Santos. Just under two years later, Pelé gave Brazil its first World Cup. In the midst of adolescence, a myth was born.
ADVERTISING
It all started 500 km from the port city, in Bauru. It was there, in the interior of the state of São Paulo, that Edson Arantes do Nascimento grew up. He was born on October 23, 1940 in Três Corações, Minas Gerais.
Pelé was educated by Dona Celeste and Dondinho, a former player who abandoned professional football at a young age because of a knee injury.
Legend has it, that is, the “King” himself, who saw his father cry in the 1950 World Cup final, when Uruguay beat Brazil 2-1 in the middle of Maracanã. To console him, little Dico – as they called him then – promeyours to him one day winning the World Cup…
ADVERTISING
Meanwhile, he was perfecting his technique in naked matches and small clubs.
In his first match with the Radiun team, he scored eight goals that thrilled the city's Amateur Football League. As journalist Luiz Carlos Cordeiro says in his book “Pelé de Bauru” (1997), the League banned him from passing midfield… so as not to end the tournament!
Bauru AC (BAC), the city's big club, incorporated the child prodigy into its youth team, where the compulsive goalscorer spent several years.
ADVERTISING
First match, first goal
BAC coach Waldemar de Brito, a former player who played in the 1934 World Cup, believed in the boy's goalscoring vocation and his quick dribbling with an unusual technique. His talent was so great that he was taken to Santos to sign a professional contract at such a young age.
Reserved, serious, talented, but very hard-working, the young striker made his professional debut on September 7, 1956, in a friendly against Corinthians de Santo André (7-1), just a month after his arrival. He came on in the second half of the game and scored a goal.
But the ball was not kind to him in the junior team: he missed a penalty in the decisive match of a competition in which his team finished runner-up.
ADVERTISING
Disappointed, he wrote to his parents, according to Alain Fontan's biography, “King Pelé”: “I know I will never be a great player. I wasn't born for this career. This has just been demonstrated.”
Determined, however, he definitively joined the professional team in January 1957. But the newcomer participated in nine consecutive matches without scoring goals, his worst performance in his 18-year career at Santos.
The first four months were tough, with just 6 goals in 21 games.
ADVERTISING
15 May 1957
May 15, 1957 arrives: Pelé becomes news and finally reveals himself: at the Morumbi stadium, Santos beats Palmeiras 3-0, with two goals from the teenager.
The first was sensational, a cross kick that excited the São Paulo press. His name started appearing in the newspapers. A month after the phenomenon manifested itself in São Paulo, it is the locals' turn to delight in the prodigy.
Pelé scores two goals against Belenenses (6-1). The Rio press is amazed. Silvio Pirillo, the team's scout, starts to pay attention to him thinking about the 1958 World Cup in Sweden.
And everything starts to happen quickly: on July 7, Pelé wears the 'canarinho' shirt at Maracanã in a friendly won by Argentina (2-1), but the young substitute scored the equalizer. Three days later, in the rematch at Pacaembu and starting for the first time, he scored in a 2-0 victory.
The story of the future and only three-time world champion continues its course.
At the end of 1957, the birth of the phenomenon was confirmed: Pelé ended up as the top scorer in the Campeonato Paulista. As he recalled on the Santos website, “in my first championship, I scored 36 goals (in 29 games, including the preliminaries). For a boy of 16, 17 years old, it was a great feat.”
Source: AFP
See also:
