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Edson Arantes do Nascimento, Pelé, earned his nickname "The King" due to the astonishing victories that led him to become the only footballer to win three World Cups, score an incredible number of goals, and achieve unprecedented feats.
Pelé, one of the greatest football players of all time, passed away this Thursday at the age of 82 due to colon cancer, in a hospital in the Brazilian city of São Paulo, where he had been hospitalized for a month.
Although other young players have reached some of the milestones he achieved during his long professional career, the football star still holds records that no one has been able to match.
The first and most significant: Pelé has been the first and only footballer who won the World Cup three times as a player.
Pelé won the FIFA World Cup with his Brazil team in 1958, 1962, and 1970. In fact, when he won the World Cup in 1958, he became the youngest champion in history, at just 17 years old.
In that edition, Pelé scored a hat-trick against France in the semifinals, in just 23 minutes. With this, he became the youngest player in history to score a hat-trick in a World Cup.
Additionally, he is the only one who has scored in a FIFA World Cup before turning 18 and the first to reach 25 international goals as a teenager.
No one has managed to surpass his record as the youngest goal scorer in the history of Brazil, at just 16 years old, nor have they been able to take away his record for assists in World Cup history (10 assists in the three World Cups in which he participated), noted the television network CNBC.
He was the second highest scorer with the shirt of a single club, having scored 643 goals in official matches for Santos, where he played for 18 years, a record surpassed by Leo Messi last year when he reached 672 with his team.
Pelé delivered countless shots on goal in the most varied and beautiful ways: facing defenders, striking with power, taking well-placed free kicks, or heading the ball firmly.
He also marked some spectacular "almost goals" throughout his career, like a shot from behind the center circle that just missed, in the 1970 World Cup. Some that seemed impossible, he managed to score, making it look easy to find the back of the net.
Pele's first World Cup goal occurred in the 66th minute of a tough match against Wales in the tournament's quarter-finals, as noted by The Canadian Press.
With his back to the goal, 17-year-old Pelé controlled the ball with his chest and quickly directed it toward the net, surpassed a defender, and unleashed a low right-footed shot that found the corner of the goal.
The Guinness Record and FIFA recognize Pelé as the player with the most goals in the history of this sport. According to Guinness, he achieved 1,279 goals in 1,363 matches, including those that occurred in friendly matches, at the amateur level in clubs, at the reserve team level, and in national youth matches.
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