Maradona

campaigned against drugs, we already know how the story ended.

Yet Pelé campaigned for Viagra and never took it.

"Many men do not go to the doctor out of shame," he began by saying in an announcement recorded in Maracana for which he charged

1.8 million euros from Pfizer laboratories

.

When asked if he took it he said he didn't need it.

A phrase that summarizes his few skills as a salesman, but to which his sentimental resume insisted on proving right.

O Rei married Rosemeri dos Reis Cholbi in 1966, with whom he had three children Edinho, Jennifer and Kelly Christina, the eldest, known during her last days for giving medical reports, and hanging photos of her father in the hospital watching the Qatar World Cup matches.

The marriage lasted ten years.

Until Rosemeri got tired of catching Pelé offside.

"I only saw him on some birthdays or on some special occasion, once or twice a year," Edinho would tell about his father.

Brazil was broadcasting their dalliances almost at the same speed as their dribbling, which ended up costing them a strange accusation of racism, for preferring them white and blonde.

That only caused Pelé to further expand his field of play.

His romances with the model Marina Montini arrived, and then with the former Miss Brazil 1989 Flavia Cavalcanti, and 1986 Deise Nunes, just after she broke up with

Julio Iglesias

.

His most famous relationship was his six years with the presenter of children's programs Xuxa, again white and blonde.

They met taking photos for a magazine cover.

She was 17 and he was 40. He invited her to dinner and she told him that she was a minor.

Then

Pelé called her father, who hung up the phone thinking it was a joke

.

They left him, of course, because of his infidelities.

"It's the women who want to be with Pelé," she said, justifying the footballer.

Pelé's wedding with Rosemari dos Reis Cholbi with whom he had three children.

In 1993, he married the doctor Assiria Lemos, as a non-white and blonde, and as if one thing were a consequence of the other, he had a vasectomy, regretted it and underwent surgery again to have the twins Josua and Celeste.

Of all his children, only

Edinho turned

out to be a footballer, but also a drug dealer.

He played as a goalkeeper for Santos and in 2014 he was sentenced to 33 years in prison for laundering drug money, although he is now free.

His third marriage would come in 2016, with the Brazilian businesswoman of Japanese origin

Marcia Aoki

, 25 years younger, with whom he had been dating since 2010 and who is now his widow.

In addition to being a father, a footballer, a husband and a bad seller of Viagra, Pelé had time in his 82 years to also become a singer, minister and actor, although of the three he is probably best known for the latter thanks to his role in the film

Escape or Victory.

, along with

Ardiles

and

Bobby Moore

, but also with

Michael Caine

and

Sylvester Stallone

, who showed up at the shoot without knowing anything about football to play the goalkeeper, and who, according to his account, asked Pelé to kick some penalties first, and that he was unable to stop any although the Brazilian told him before where he was going to throw them.

Pelé during the filming of the movie 'Evasion or Victory'.

It is almost impossible to list the titles, honorary posts, and paid posts he received or earned throughout his career, such as UN World Citizen, British Empire Knight of Honor, UNESCO Good Wishes Ambassador, Goodwill of Unicef, and Sport of the World Economic Forum.

It is also impossible to list all his trophies, probably received in the 84 metals of the periodic table.

It is known that 2,000 prizes and memorabilia were auctioned in London just six years ago.

Among them

are the three medals from his three world cups

, the Jules Rimet Cup, the boots he wore in

Escape or Victory

, the American League champion's ring, the torch he carried at the Athens Olympics, the trophy for best FIFA player of the century, passports, shirts, watches, accreditations, their school notes.

Part of the proceeds went to the Pequeño Príncipe de Curitiba children's hospital, in Paraná.

"I could keep it all, but that doesn't help anyone," he claimed, unable to prevent all of Brazil from talking about his economic problems.

His role as Minister of Sports lasted for four years of the government of

Henrique Cardoso

.

Although he approved the so-called Pele Law to prevent tax evasion by clubs, he had to leave office in 1998 accused of benefiting his marketing company.

Cardoso summed up the best of his administration in his farewell speech: "There are Brazilians who one day committed crimes and who today are being rehabilitated in prisons. In thirteen states today we have women making sports uniforms and men making balls. There are already a thousand a month" .

In the early 1990s, Pelé and his friend Helio Viana created the company Pelé, Sports and Marketing, which would become one of the largest sports rights management companies in Brazil.

For ten years both shared business and scandals.

The company was accused of multimillion-dollar transactions through

accounts in the Virgin Islands, Bahamas and Liechtenstein to avoid the Brazilian tax.

Also to keep $700,000 destined for Unicef ​​Argentina.

Pelé and Putin, before a Russia-New Zealand Confederations Cup match in Saint Petersburg in 2017.EFE

The partners separated and the former soccer player created the Pele Pro company, which would lead another scandal in the organization of the so-called Peace Cup promoted by the South Korean reverend Sun Myung Moon, which accumulated numerous losses.

In addition to Viagra, Pelé was the image of the Vitassay antidepressant, Unicor health insurance, Mastercard credit cards, drinks, shares on the Sao Paulo Stock Exchange, among others.

He had coffee shops, a construction company that failed, a Puma retro clothing line that never got off the ground.

He was paid to be the image of himself in series, documentaries, video games, an Indian cartoon movie.

Hours before being hospitalized,

Mark Zuckerberg

signed him up to promote WhasApp Pay.

Former US President Bill Clinton dances with Pelé during a visit to Brazil with Reuters

A decade ago, the Brazilian publication

Isto e Dinheiro

assured that Pelé billed 15 million euros a year only in image rights.

And that he did not carry out advertising campaigns for less than a million euros, which included two days of recording and photos that could be used for six months.

In 2016, he sued Samsung for 30 million euros for making an ad featuring a footballer who looked like him.

His fortune, according to the American portal

Celebrity Net Worth

, amounts to

100 million euros

and despite this he has received a pension since 2014.

Although his number of children is uncertain, in this century he also ended up acknowledging the paternity of a 32-year-old woman, Flavia Christina Kurtz, the result of a fleeting relationship in the late 1960s. A woman named Sandra Regina managed to prove it with forced DNA tests. that Pelé was his father, the result of a relationship with the lady who cleaned his house, but the star never recognized her.

She died of cancer in 2006 and it was controversial that O Rei did not attend the wake, which forced him to issue a press release in which he said that he had prayed for his recovery and sent him flowers.

It was published that Pelé hates funeral settings, and that he even skipped saying goodbye to his parents.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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