Edson Arantes do Nascimento (Brazilian Portuguese: ['etso (w)a'ratSiz du nasi'metu]; born 23 October 1940), known as Pele ([pe'le]), is a Brazilian retired professional footballer who played as a forward. He is widely regarded as the greatest football player of all time. In 1999, he was voted World Player of the Century by the International Federation of Football History & Statistics (IFFHS). That same year, Pele was elected Athlete of the Century by the International Olympic Committee.

Pele was born on 23 October 1940, in Tres Coracoes, Minas Gerais, Brazil, the son of Fluminense footballer Dondinho (born Joao Ramos do Nascimento) and Celeste Arantes. He was the elder of two siblings. He was named after the American inventor Thomas Edison. His parents decided to remove the "i" and call him "Edson", but there was a mistake on the birth certificate, leading many documents to show his name as "Edison", not "Edson", as he is called. He was originally nicknamed "Dico" by his family. He received the nickname "Pele" during his school days, when it is claimed he was given it because of his pronunciation of the name of his favorite player, local Vasco da Gama goalkeeper Bile, which he misspoke but the more he complained the more it stuck. In his autobiography, Pele stated he had no idea what the name means, nor did his old friends. Apart from the assertion that the name is derived from that of Bile, and that it is Hebrew for "miracle" (pe'le), the word has no known meaning in Portuguese.  Pele grew up in poverty in Bauru in the state of Sao Paulo. He earned extra money by working in tea shops as a servant. Taught to play by his father, he could not afford a proper football and usually played with either a sock stuffed with newspaper and tied with a string or a grapefruit. He played for several amateur teams in his youth, including Sete de Setembro, Canto do Rio, Sao Paulinho, and Ameriquinha. Pele led Bauru Athletic Club juniors (coached by Waldemar de Brito) to two Sao Paulo state youth championships. In his mid-teens, he played for an indoor football team called Radium. Indoor football had just become popular in Bauru when Pele began playing it. He was part of the first Futebol de Salao (indoor football) competition in the region. Pele and his team won the first championship and several others.  According to Pele, indoor football presented difficult challenges; he said it was a lot quicker than football on the grass and that players were required to think faster because everyone is close to each other in the pitch. Pele accredits indoor football for helping him think better on the spot. In addition, indoor football allowed him to play with adults when he was about 14 years old. In one of the tournaments he participated, he was initially considered too young to play, but eventually went on to end up top scorer with fourteen or fifteen goals. "That gave me a lot of confidence", Pele said, "I knew then not to be afraid of whatever might come". Answer this question using a quote from the following article:

When did he start playing football?
grapefruit. He played for several amateur teams in his youth,