‘A real legend’ - Cork footballer remembers the day he played against Pelé

“I know I was playing against Pelé but after the game, I was thinking, you’d loved to have seen him get more of the ball to see what he would do with it,” observes former Cork Hibs and Cork Celtic striker Carl Humphreys as he recalls the day that he played against the three-time World Cup winner.

Humphreys (71), who found himself training with England World Cup heroes Bobby Moore, Martin Peters and Geoff Hurst, when he signed for West Ham as a 16-year-old, remembers well the day that he found himself sharing a pitch with the brilliant Brazilian in the North American Soccer League.

[ Pelé and the Cosmos: How the Brazilian conquered America ]

“I was playing with Hibs and we went on a tour of the States in, I think, 1976 and we played a game in Chicago and St Louis Stars saw me and offered me a contract so I stayed for a season and that’s how I ended up playing against Pelé, when we went to play the New York Cosmos in June 1977.

“We played them in Giants Stadium, and they had a fine team – they had Pelé but they also his Brazilian teammate, Carlos Alberto, who captained them when they won the World Cup in 1970, and they had a brilliant Italian striker, Georgio Chinaglia who scored over 190 goals in the NASL.

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“They beat us 2-0 on the day and Pelé was class but I remember going up to him at half-time as we were walking off and asking him for his jersey after the game – I told him that I was Irish and that it was for my kids back in Ireland and he smiled and said, ‘No problem’.

“But he went off injured with about 20 minutes to go and I think he was taken to hospital because there was no sign of him around the ground afterwards, so I never got the jersey which was a pity because it really would have been something to treasure.”

Revealing he was both sad and upset when he heard the news of Pelé’s death on Thursday, just as was when he heard of Maradona’s passing in 2020, Humphreys spent much of Friday watching clips of the great Brazilian on TV, which made him realise yet again how lucky he was to play against him.

“God forgive me, but it’s only now that he’s dead that you sort of appreciate it more and the fact that it wasn’t a friendly but a proper competitive league game – a lot of people might have play against him in testimonials or friendlies – but this was an important league game.”

Humphreys revealed that for him, as for millions around the world, it was the Brazil team of the 1970 World Cup that made him fall in love with Brazilian football as, with Pelé and players like Jairinzho, Rivelino, Tostao, Gerson, Clodoaldo and Carlos Alberto, they swept all before them.

[ The day Pelé and Santos didn’t live up to their billing in Dalymount Park ]

“I had come back to Cork in 1969 and I had a huge interest in the World Cup and seeing England with the three West Ham players, Martin Peters and Geoff Hurst and Bobby Moore, who were very good to me when I was Upton Park because he was pally with Noel Cantwell and he knew I was from Cork.

“Of course, Brazil beat England 1-0 to knock them out, but they were a great Brazilian team and after that I was mad about Brazilian football – if you told me there was a Brazilian playing down Flower Lodge or Turners Cross, no matter if he was only a factory player, I’d have been down there.”

Not that Pelé and Bobby Moore were the only players to play in the World Cup that Humphreys was to cross paths with, because in 1975, when playing with Athlone Town FC, he found himself facing AC Milan with two members of the Italian team beaten by Brazil in the 1970 World Cup final.

“They had Gianni Rivera up front and Enrico Albertosi in goal – they had both been in that Italian team beaten by Brazil in Mexico – we drew with them 0-0 in St Mel’s Park in Athlone and we missed a penalty and then they beat us 3-0 in the San Siro but it was a brilliant occasion.”

Although Humphreys modestly avoids mentioning it, the Italian press raved afterwards about the skilful Corkman’s performance that night in the San Siro with several Italian papers reporting that he received a standing ovation from 70,000 Milan fans as he came off with ten minutes to go.

Fast forward two years and just a month before he encountered Pelé in the Giants Stadium, Humphreys found himself facing another footballing legend in May 1977 when St Louis Stars went down 3-2 to a Los Angeles Aztecs team featuring one George Best in their line-up.

“I was playing up front and their full-back was kicking me and kicking me and kicking me and I eventually hit him, and didn’t the ref see me, and I got a red card and as I was walking off, George came over to me and said something like ‘It had to be the Irish in me,’ laughing away.”

Although he missed out playing with Best when the European Cup medal winner played a couple of games for Cork Celtic in 1975, Humphreys did find himself lining out with another top player when West German 1966 World Cup final captain, Uwe Seeler, lined out for Cork Celtic in Turners Cross in 1978.

For Humphreys, who won a League of Ireland medal with Waterford and an FAI Cup Medal with Cork Hibs, Best is up there with Pelé, Maradona, Cruyff and Messi as among the greatest players he has ever seen but he’s slow to be drawn on who he considers the finest footballer ever.

“Pelé or Maradona – it’s a toss of a coin really and there’s no winners in that debate – they were both brilliant players and they were both playing at a time when there was serious tackling – I was watching Pelé the other day and the punishment he took from the Portuguese in 1966 was unreal.

“There was this hatchet man, chopping him down and of course after 1966, he said he was retiring from international football, and he did for a while but thankfully he came back and won the World Cup in 1970 and gave us all those wonderful memories – what a player, a real legend.”