Top 60 Pelé Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “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.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Success Quotes, Soccer Quotes

2. “Everything is practice.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Soccer Quotes

3. “There is always someone out there getting better than you by training harder than you.”

— Pelé

4. “The more difficult the victory, the greater the happiness in winning.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Victory Quotes

5. “Success isn’t determined by how many times you win, but by how you play the week after you lose.”

— Pelé

6. “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.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Teamwork Quotes, Football Quotes

7. “No individual can win a game by himself.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Teamwork Quotes

8. “Most important is be a good man.”

— Pelé

9. “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.”

— Pelé

10. “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.”

— Pelé

11. “Football is the best, is the biggest sport in the world.”

— Pelé

12. “I was born to play football, just like Beethoven was born to write music and Michelangelo was born to paint.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Football Quotes

13. “Everything on earth is a game. A passing thing. We all end up dead. We all end up the same, don’t we?”

— Pelé

14. “Brazil eats, sleeps and drinks football. It lives football!”

— Pelé

15. “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.”

— Pelé

16. “I don’t believe there is such a thing as a ‘born’ soccer player. Perhaps you are born with certain skills and talents, but quite frankly it seems impossible to me that one is actually born to be an ace soccer player.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Soccer Quotes

17. “The head talks to the heart and the heart talks to the feet.”

— Pelé

18. “I want to do my best to make the people happy. I play with my heart for the sport.”

— Pelé

19. “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.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Football Quotes, Quotes About Growing Up

20. “When you control the ball you control the score.”

— Pelé

21. “George Best was the greatest player in the world.”

— Pelé

22. “Sport is something that is very inspirational for young people.”

— Pelé

23. “If you don’t give education to people, it is easy to manipulate them.”

— Pelé

24. “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.”

— Pelé

25. “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.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Soccer Quotes

26. “I don’t think I’m a very good businessman. I act too much with my heart.”

— Pelé

27. “A penalty is a cowardly way to score.”

— Pelé

Featured in: Soccer Quotes

28. “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.”

— Pelé

29. “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.”

— Pelé

30. “I sometimes lie awake at night and wonder why I am still so popular and, to be honest, I don’t know.”

— Pelé

31. “The bicycle kick is not easy to do.”

— Pelé

32. “Enthusiasm is everything. It must...”

— Pelé

33. “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.”

— Pelé

34. “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.”

— Pelé

35. “Always when I come to the field, I try to do my best for other people.”

— Pelé

36. “If you ever want to be a decent player, you have to be able to use both feet without stopping to think about it.”

— Pelé

37. “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.”

— Pelé

38. “The level of football in England is the top. English football is the leader in the world.”

— Pelé

39. “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.”

— Pelé

40. “We’re not great friends, but I admire him. If he thinks he’s the best player of the century, that’s his problem.”

— Pelé

41. “The biggest family in the world is football, because football has more associate – and FIFA, for example – has more associates than UNESCO.”

— Pelé

42. “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.”

— Pelé

43. “No doubt, I am earning more money with my endorsements than I ever earned playing soccer.”

— Pelé

44. “Wherever you go, there are three icons that everyone knows: Jesus Christ, Pele and Coca-Cola.”

— Pelé

45. “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.”

— Pelé

46. “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.”

— Pelé

47. “People always ask me: ‘When is the new Pele going to be born?’ Never. My father and mother have closed the factory.”

— Pelé

48. “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.”

— Pelé

49. “Brazil, always they buy from the United States. The first who was sell to the United States was football.”

— Pelé

50. “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.”

— Pelé