One year after death, the world continues to pay praise to Pelé, Edson and Dico – 12/28/2023 – Sports

The first anniversary of Pelé’s death is yet another excuse for paying tribute to the King of Football. Not that they have stopped at any point since the star’s body stopped, at the age of 82, on December 29, 2022, due to complications arising from colon cancer.

Over the past 12 months, praise for the three-time world champion has been constant, on the most varied platforms, in all parts of the world. There were tributes in Três Corações, place of birth, Bauru, land of the first kicks, and Santos, the most frequent stage.

There was also in Paris, where FIFA (International Football Federation) held its annual awards ceremony for the best of the season, in February. As expected, a large part of the ceremony was dedicated to the man who enchanted the planet with his talent. It was up to former player Ronaldo to try to summarize what Edson Arantes do Nascimento represented for the sport.

“He was a player far ahead of his time, an athlete who served as an inspiration to me and everyone in football. In the 1950s, he was already modern, he kicked with both legs, jumped higher than others, scored goals bicycle, head. I also remember him as a dear friend. When I had my first knee injury, in 2000, he visited me at my home, bringing me lots of love and care in one of the most difficult moments of my life”, said Ronaldo.

“Pelé will also be remembered for his impact on society. When he played, the world was an even more racist place than it was today. He, a black athlete, became the king of the most popular sport on the planet. He showed that black people can be the best, most successful, and can defeat racism. This fight is not over yet, but I ask that everyone be inspired by King Pelé’s fight”, he added.

Although the lack of greater engagement in this fight is a frequent criticism of Edson, Pelé’s impact is in fact undeniable. On people of all ages, from the most varied backgrounds. And even in fiction.

The writer Nelson Rodrigues, the first to call the player the king, included in his chronicles the “grã-fina with the nostrils of a corpse”, a caricatured character who didn’t understand anything about football and appeared at the stadium asking who had the ball. But even she bowed before the howling majesty. “What magnetized her was Pelé as a man, myth and hero.”

It is not surprising, therefore, that the tributes have been constant throughout this year. The Brazilian Championship had a minute of silence in each of its 380 matches and was named Brasileirão Rei. In cruel irony, after years of flirting with the second division, Santos was finally relegated.

The script makes it difficult not to embrace the corny observation that the six-time national champion club with Pelé waited for his death to fulfill an inevitable destiny. In any case, warned the new black and white president, in Series B no one will wear the number 10 shirt that once belonged to the greatest.

It will be another tribute, in an endless list that does not fit in one text. There were tributes to the star Pelé, the man Edson and little Dico, as grandmother Ambrosina called the boy from Três Corações.

In the recently released “Dico: the Boy Who Lived in the Heart of Pelé”, Celso de Campos Jr. uses illustrations by Lhaiza Morena to show that the boy shaped the man and forged the star. If Pelé liked to refer to Edson in the third person, there was a second among them, Dico.

“Does it happen that when a child grows up, he disappears? Nothing like that”, the children’s work asks and answers. “When someone has a child in their heart, they gain infinite powers. Do you want to see?”, continues Campos Jr., before playfully reconstructing the King of Football’s trajectory.

Three Hearts, three people in one. Three words, or one: the famous “love, love, love”, said during his retirement in the United States.

“These words came from Pelé’s heart”, reports the book “Dico”. “And we know who lived there, right?”