CNN
—
Thousands lined the streets on Tuesday as a funeral procession took on big football Pele to his final resting place.
had started in the Caldera Urban Stadiumhome of Pelé’s former Santos club, and his coffin was carried through the streets of the city of Santos, including the street where Pelé’s mother, Celeste Arantes, 100, lives.
He continued to the Memorial Necrópole Ecumênica cemetery, where a private funeral would be held for the relatives.
The three-time World Cup winner died on Thursday at the age of 82 from multiple organ failure due to the progression of colon cancer.
Since then, tributes have poured in from around the world, with people of all ages flocking to his 24-hour public wake, which began Monday at Santos’ 16,000-seat stadium, popularly known as “Vila Belmiro.”
More than 230,000 people, many of whom wore Brazil’s iconic yellow jersey, attended the wake, according to Santos.
The stadium gates were closed with thousands of mourners still lining up and people being turned away, according to CNN crews on the ground.
Huge crowds then lined the streets, waving flags and cheering as the Brazilian’s coffin passed by.
Pele’s sister, Lucia, was seen tearfully waving from a balcony to the crowd that had gathered outside her mother’s house. The coffin then made it to the cemetery.
brazilian president Lula da Silva He arrived at the wake Tuesday morning with “very” beefed up police security to accommodate the president’s presence, Santos told CNN.
“Pele is incomparable, as a soccer player and as a human being,” Lula said on Tuesday, according to Reuters.
FIFA president Gianni Infantino also traveled to Brazil to pay his respects on Monday.
“Pele is eternal,” Infantino told reporters, according to Reuters. “FIFA will certainly honor the ‘king’ as he deserves.
“We have asked all the football associations in the world to observe a minute of silence before each game and we will also ask 211 countries to name a stadium after Pelé. Future generations must know and remember who Pele was.”
For more than 60 years, the name Pelé has been synonymous with soccer. He played in four World Cups and is the only player in history to win three, but his legacy stretched far beyond his trophy and his remarkable goalscoring record.
“I was born to play soccer, just like Beethoven was born to write music and Michelangelo was born to paint,” Pelé said.
Pelé, born Edson Arantes do Nascimento, is widely considered one of the greatest players in history and Brazil celebrated three days of national mourning after his death.
