Top 100 Pele's Quotes
#1. That was Pele's strength - holding people off with his arm.
Ron Atkinson
#2. Leo [Messi] is the best player of all time - better than Pele, Maradona or Cruyff. There have been some great teams in history - Pele's Brazil, Cruyff's Ajax, Sacchi's Milan - but in the past 20 years this Barcelona team is the best.
Xavi
#3. Ever since Pele's extraordinary talents blessed the world of football, black footballers have been accepted in the pantheon of the greats. But to achieve commercial recognition is somewhat different: it requires a form of adulation that also spells identification and role model.
Martin Jacques
#4. That save from Pele's header was the best I ever made. I didn't have any idea how famous it would become - to start with, I didn't even realise I'd made it at all.
Gordon Banks
#5. Pele doesn't die. Pele will never die. Pele is going to go on for ever.
Pele
#6. Football is the only sport where you put people together, it doesn't matter if you are rich, or poor, or black, or white. It is one nation. This is the beauty of football.
Pele
#7. His vision was just outstanding. If you think of him in the same way as Pele then you would come close.
Leonard Cohen
#8. Pele wasn't as gifted as George Best and I would definitely put George above Johan Cruyff because he had more heart,
Johnny Giles
#9. I can't be compared to Pele. I need to do so much more to be compared to Pele. Pele is fantastic. And he's unique.
Neymar
#10. I was born to play football, just like Beethoven was born to write music and Michelangelo was born to paint.
Pele
#11. If you don't give education to people, it is easy to manipulate them.
Pele
#12. The head talks to the heart and the heart talks to the feet.
Pele
#14. Pele was the only footballer who surpassed the boundaries of logic.
Osvaldo Ardiles
#15. A team is not made up of isolated individuals. Always stay in the game. Don't be passive. Football is a team game. No one plays alone. Success depends on your whole team being a single unit.
Pele
#16. Brazil eats, sleeps and drinks football. It lives football!
Pele
#17. Football is the best, is the biggest sport in the world.
Pele
#18. He is the best. The best in the world, yes. Probably the best ever. I saw Maradona a couple of times. I never saw Pele. But Cristiano is amazing. This man is the best ... Cristiano is a goals machine. He is an incredible player. He is like Zidane, there will never be another Ronaldo.
Jose Mourinho
#19. You must respect people and work hard to be in shape. And I used to train very hard. When the others players went to the beach after training, I was there kicking the ball.
Pele
#20. To be a striker you need to be in good shape.
Pele
#21. At 17, I already had responsibility because I took care of my family, but in the football I was young; I wasn't experienced or the captain - I was just in the team.
Pele
#22. No doubt, I am earning more money with my endorsements than I ever earned playing soccer.
Pele
#23. Critics have always questioned whether players like Pele from the 50s could play today. Lionel Messi could play in the 1950s and the present day, as could Di Stefano, Pele, Maradona, Cruyff because they are all great players. Lionel Messi without question fits into that category.
Alex Ferguson
#24. I want to do my best to make the people happy. I play with my heart for the sport.
Pele
#25. Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do
Pele
#26. I think he'll reach 1000 goals, but he'll never overtake my total.
(on 40-year old Romario)
Pele
#27. It's difficult to talk about Pele because I didn't see him.
Thierry Henry
#28. Unless your kid is Pele Jr., they're not going to be able to feed themselves from soccer. If your kid knows how to play soccer, but not make dinner, you have done them a disservice.
Alton Brown
#29. I wanted to be a soccer player, and I became the best of the best, the number one, better than Maradona, better than Pele, and even better than Messi - but only at night, nighttime, during my dreams. When I wake up, I realized that I have wooden legs and that I'm doomed to be a writer.
Eduardo Galeano
#30. For 20 years they have asked me the same question, who is the greatest? Pele or Maradona? I replay that all you have to do is look at the facts - how many goals did he score with his right foot or with his head?
Pele
#31. Everything on earth is a game. A passing thing. We all end up dead. We all end up the same, don't we?
Pele
#32. Pele was a complete player. I didn't see him live obviously, because I wasn't born
David Beckham
#33. People always ask me: 'When is the new Pele going to be born?' Never. My father and mother have closed the factory.
Pele
#34. My favorite television show of all time is 'Hill Street Blues.' I think it's the show that is to television what Pele was to football or Muhammad Ali was to boxing.
Lennie James
#35. I love people. I wanted to be with the people. I wanted to give something back what I get from football, because God gave everything to me.
Pele
#36. When I was minister of sport in Brazil, I tried to bring in a law that would make the chairmen of clubs reveal their accounts like other businesses. It was turned down, but I think it is an important story that will make a good film.
Pele
#37. Over the years I've learnt to live with two persons in my heart. One is Edson, who has fun with his friends and family; the other is the football player Pele. I didn't want the name. 'Pele' sounds like baby-talk in Portuguese.
Pele
#38. If I pass away one day, I am happy because I tried to do my best. My sport allowed me to do so much because it's the biggest sport in the world.
Pele
#39. All my life I thank God. My family was very religious.
Pele
#40. Brazil, always they buy from the United States. The first who was sell to the United States was football.
Pele
#41. The World Cup is a very important way to measure the good players, and the great ones. It is a test of a great player.
Pele
#42. The biggest family in the world is football, because football has more associate - and FIFA, for example - has more associates than UNESCO.
Pele
#43. Everyone talks about the forwards, the players when they are scoring goals. But sometimes I look for the complete player not just the players who score but those who can pass.
Pele
#44. I've come to accept that the life of a frontrunner is a hard one, that he will suffer more injuries than most men and that many of these injuries will not be accidental.
Pele
#45. Enthusiasm is everything. It must ...
Pele
#46. When you control the ball you control the score
Pele
#47. Lionel Messi is a wonderful player. Very skillful. Highly intelligent. He is not good in the air.
Pele
#48. No individual can win a game by himself.
Pele
#49. I played futsal growing up in Baurd. In futsal you need to think quick and play quick so its easier for you when you move to normal football.
Pele
#50. Considerable research on successful soccer players and their developmental history, affirms that a good percentage of them have spent time in isolation, working on soccer skills.
Pele
#51. I always think that I would have become an actor if I hadn't been a soccer player.
Pele
#53. The first World Cup I remember was in the 1950 when I was 9 or 10 years old. My father was a soccer player, and there was a big party, and when Brazil lost to Uruguay, I saw my father crying.
Pele
#54. Wherever you go, there are three icons that everyone knows: Jesus Christ, Pele and Coca-Cola.
Pele
#55. When I was playing, they said soccer was a man's world and women should remain on the sidelines, all I can say is I'm glad I never had to go up against Mia Hamm
Pele
#56. There would be no debate about who was the best footballer the world had ever seen - me or Pele. Everyone would say me.
Diego Maradona
#57. When you play against dirty players or very tough players, it's easy to escape because you know what they're going to do. But when the player is tough but intelligent, it's much more difficult.
Pele
#58. Every kid around the world who plays soccer wants to be Pele. I have a great responsibility to show them not just how to be like a soccer player, but how to be like a man.
Pele
#59. People who say that only young people voted on the Internet, those who didn't see Pele play, forget that children are not orphans. There's always a father who buys the computer and perhaps influences their vote. I won the people's vote.
Diego Maradona
#60. Fella's a genius. Best ever by a distance in my life time. Never really saw Pele ... Souness, Gullit, Venables and now Rooney agree Messi is the best they have seen. He plays a game with which we are not familiar.
Gary Lineker
#61. I am constantly being asked about individuals. The only way to win is as a team. Football is not about one or two or three star players.
Pele
#62. Edson is the person that supports Pele. Edson is the base. Pele just comes and adds the face.
Pele
#63. Most important is be a good man.
Pele
#64. I think that France, Germany, Spain, Holland and England will join Brazil in the semi-finals.
Pele
#65. Everything is practice.
Pele
#66. I always had a philosophy which I got from my father. He used to say, 'Listen. God gave to you the gift to play football. This is your gift from God. If you take care of your health, if you are in good shape all the time, with your gift from God no one will stop you, but you must be prepared.'
Pele
#67. Brazil is crazy about football. People, they wait for this moment, but this doesn't mean we are going to win the championship. That is the problem.
Pele
#68. Of course, my father was a soccer player. He used to play very good. Then, when I was young, eight or nine years old, ten years old, I just want to be like my father.
Pele
#69. In 1962, my injury wasn't because of violence; I just kicked the ball and it happened. And that was OK because Brazil won; I didn't have any difficulty in accepting that. I still got a medal because I'd played two games.
Pele
#70. His left foot is fantastic. It's like Mozart. God gave Freddy the gift to play soccer. If he is prepared mentally and physically, nobody will stop him.
(on Freddy Adu)
Pele
#71. It is good to be Compared with the best player [Pele]. But my dad told me about Garrincha's style as he moved forward, went up, attacked and dribbled. Garrincha's style is more similar to Neymar's.
Neymar
#72. Yes, I have a lot of business interests. But I don't work for just anyone, and I choose the companies very carefully.
Pele
#73. Pele is the greatest player in football history, and there would only be one Pele in the world.
Osvaldo Ardiles
#74. Love is more important than what we can take ... Please say with me three times-Love! Love! Love!
Pele
#75. I treat everybody the same. You know I love to be with people: the youngsters.
Pele
#76. He is the greatest player in the world right now, without a doubt, he is the player who gives Brazilians the most joy.
(on Ronaldinho)
Pele
#77. If you ever want to be a decent player, you have to be able to use both feet without stopping to think about it.
Pele
#78. When I retired, at that time I had a lot of proposals to play in Europe, England, Italy, Spain, Mexico. But I said no, after 18 years I want to rest, because I want to retire.
Pele
#79. A penalty is a cowardly way to score.
Pele
#80. We're not great friends, but I admire him. If he thinks he's the best player of the century, that's his problem.
Pele
#81. I don't think I'm a very good businessman. I act too much with my heart.
Pele
#82. That's great, tell him he's Pele and get him back on.
John Lambie
#83. Messi is the best player of all time. Better than Pele, better than Maradona and better than anyone else.
Adriano Galliani
#84. George Best was the greatest player in the world.
Pele
#85. The World Cup is a very complicated tournament - six games, seven if you make it to the final - and maybe if you lose one game you're out, even if you're the best.
Pele
#86. Everybody knows my life. I won a lot of tournaments and scored more than 1,000 goals, won three World Cups but I could not play in Olympic Games.
Pele
#87. Great teams are not made up of many well-rounded players. Great teams are made up of a variety of players, each having their own strengths.
Pele
#88. The bicycle kick is not easy to do.
Pele
#89. There's Pele the man, and then Pele the player. And to play like Pele is to play like God.
Eusebio
#90. When football stars disappear, so do the teams, and that is a very curious phenomenon. It is like in the theatre, in a play, where there is a great star. If the star is not well, the whole cast suffers.
Pele
#91. Football is like a religion to me. I worship the ball, and I treat it like a god. Too many players think of a football as something to kick. They should be taught to caress it and to treat it like a precious gem.
Pele
#92. Nelson Mandela was one of the most influential people in my life. He was my hero, my friend, and also a companion to me in our fight for the people and for world peace. Let us all continue his legacy with purpose and passion.
Pele
#93. Brazil's always had great players, both at home and abroad, but we need to put all that talent together and mould a team out of it.
Pele
#94. I have to trust something that gives me power; I have to believe in something, but in my career I have a lot of moments I cannot explain with God.
Pele
#95. Enthusiasm is everything. It must be taut and vibrating like a guitar string.
Pele
#96. The best of all was Pele, who is a mixture of Di Stefano, Maradona, Cruyff and Leo Messi.
Osvaldo Ardiles
#97. The level of football in England is the top. English football is the leader in the world.
Pele
#98. Messi is undoubtedly a gifted footballer, like Maradona and Pele, and he's playing for the best club side in the world at the moment. He's successful and he's winning trophies, so it's only logical that he'll be voted the best player in the world.
Oliver Kahn
#99. Ronaldo has come through for the past two or three years and is the best in Europe. I think at the moment no doubt Ronaldo is the best player.
Pele
#100. It was with a homosexual, I was barely 14 years old. But let's be fair, I wasn't the only one who did it. He was a man in Bauru that all our team visited.
Pele
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