Football: Brazilian legend Pelé’s family gathers at hospital in Sao Paulo

Brazilian football legend Pelé. Photo / AP

Family members of Brazilian football great Pelé are gathering at the Albert Einstein hospital in Sao Paulo where the 82-year-old global icon has been since the end of November.

Doctors said earlier this week that Pelé's cancer had advanced, adding the three-time World Cup winner is under “elevated care” related to “kidney and cardiac dysfunctions.”

No other hospital statements have been published since.

Edson Cholbi Nascimento, one of Pelé's sons and known as Edinho, arrived this weekend, one day after he gave a news conference to deny he would visit his father in hospital.

Edinho, who works for a football club in southern Brazil, had said then that only doctors could help his father.

“He (Edson) is here,” Kely Nascimento, one of Pelé's daughters, said in a post on Instagram with a picture showing her sitting next to Edinho and two of his children at the hospital. “I am not leaving, no one will take me out of here.”

Hours later, Edinho, a former Santos goalkeeper, posted a picture showing his hand holding his father’s.

“Dad ... my strength is yours,” Pelé's son said.

Edson Arantes do Nascimento, who is globally known as Pelé, had a colon tumour removed in September 2021. Neither his family nor the hospital have said whether it had spread to other organs.