The Four Greatest South American Soccer Players In History

Pelé (Edson Arantes do Nascimento)

Pelé was a player who never played European club soccer. His loyalty to Santos remained; however, for Brazil, Pelé’s ball talents in the World Cup destroyed many European teams. He made his World Cup debut for Brazil in 1958, in which he became the youngest player to score in the World Cup final against Sweden. Needless to say, Brazil won this World Cup, and Pelé would go on to win a further two Jules Rimet trophies. In 1962, Pelé played a small part before injury. Then, in 1970, Pelé starred for Brazil once again, where he scored four goals. As such, Brazil made it to the final and won the game 4-1.

Pelé also won the Golden Ball award. Overall, Pele was renowned for his dribbling, passing, pace, and formidable goal-scoring record with 77 goals scored for Brazil in total, which is the recorduh number. As such, Pelé is one of the great soccer players.

Ronaldo (Luís Nazário de Lima)

Ronaldo is perhaps the best striker of recent times. For both club and country, Ronaldo has been a prolific goal-scoring player, with great pace, dribbling, and finishing. For PSV, his goal-scoring talents were evident, as he scored 42 goals in 46 games. With Barcelona, he kept on scoring goals with 34 in 37 league games. Overall, most of his club soccer was with Real Madrid, where Ronaldo won two La Liga titles with the club.

For Brazil, Ronaldo also scored the second-highest number of goals in the FIFA World Cup with 15 in total. Such goals invariably helped Brazil win the World Cup in 2002, where he was the top goal-scoring player of that World Cup. Ronaldo was also the FIFA World Player of the Year three times during his playing career.

Lionel Messi

Lionel Messi is an exceptional forward, playmaker, and winger who has maintained elite playing performance throughout his career. His amazing dribbling, ball control, and goal-scoring prowess made Messi one of the finest South American players to grace soccer. When it comes to scoring goals, Messi was undoubtedly more prolific than Maradona.

Messi received a record eight FIFA World Player of the Year awards and won an astonishing 46 club trophies with his teams. He scooped most of his trophies when playing for Barcelona, including 10 La Liga titles and four Champions Leagues. His crowning moment in international soccer came when Argentina won the 2022 FIFA World Cup in a campaign in which Messi scored several times.

End of My Greatest South American Soccer Players Rant

So, those were four of the greatest South American soccer players. Maradona, Ronaldo, Messi, and Pelé are four of the finest soccer players to have played the game, and brought great triumphs to both their clubs and countries. Overall, they were the best players of their eras.