His Majesty

IS THE KING DEAD? Not yet. Not quite.

When that headline ran in a Rio de Janeiro newspaper in 1966, it seemed to a lot of soccer fans that Edson Arantes do Nascimento, alias Pele, alias the King, was indeed dead--or at least he had lost his crown. The exciting, agile, acrobatic youth who almost single-handed won Brazil the World Cup in 1958 and led his Santos team to two world professional-club championships was now 27, married, rich, overweight --naturally--and the goat of Brazil's loss to Hungary in the 1966 World Cup playoffs. The spotlight moved from Pele to the pretenders: England's Bobby Charlton, Portugal's Eusebio.

It turned back last week. Led by a slimmed-down, rejuvenated Pele, who set up one goal with a leaping, twisting head pass, the other with a deft little sideways kick, Santos beat archrival Sao Paulo 2-1--thereby winning the Sao Paulo Cup for the eighth time in ten years and stamping itself once again as probably the best pro club in the world. "This is what I wanted!" shouted the King--his crown safe again.

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