sport news Three Englishmen recall special time in New York playing with Brazilian genius ... trends now

Pele's glittering career closed with three years at New York Cosmos, where he graciously agreed to all manner of requests in the name of promoting the beautiful game, including once leading his team out on horseback while wearing a cowboy hat.

These were surreal times in the North American Soccer League. Celebrities mingled in the dressing room and the Cosmos players were invited to hang out at New York's wild Studio 54 nightclub.

It was also an era of opportunity for a select group of British footballers who got to know the greatest footballer of all time.

Steve Hunt had made only a handful of appearances for Aston Villa when the Cosmos signed him in 1977, Pele's final season. 

It was a glamorous launchpad for a fine career including spells at Coventry, West Brom, a return to Villa and two England caps, all chronicled in his entertaining book 'I'm with the Cosmos' published by Pitch in 2021. 

'I was with the apprentices around the Villa Park dressing rooms when Santos came to play in 1972. Pele came in afterwards and had a picture taken with half a dozen of us. That was him all over, very approachable, very humble.

'It's hard to believe five years later I was flying off to Bermuda for pre-season with the Cosmos. The team met me outside the hotel. Pele was immaculately dressed in a lemon suit and I looked like Robert Plant, all rock 'n' roll, with long hair. I was nervous. He was great, like I'd known him all my life.

'If anyone could carry off a pastel suit, Pele could. He had style and time for everybody. It was an impossible job promoting soccer in America but he did it brilliantly. 

'Because of his impact, we were selling 80,000 tickets by the end of that season, and when you see the USA acquitting themselves well in the World Cup, that's a legacy of Pele. No doubt.

'I was 20 years old, a bit of a hothead, and in one of the first games, I had what I thought was a good effort on goal. It just skimmed the bar and I was quite pleased but Pele wasn't pleased. He thought I should've passed and remonstrated with me. Unfortunately, I reacted the wrong way.'

(Hunt flipped Pele the finger and stuck his fingers into his ears when Pele continued to chastise him)

'It wasn't long before my number went up and I was substituted. I'm a little bit ashamed of what I did. But we got over it. I apologised and we went from strength to strength. You couldn't fail to learn from him.

'What stuck out for me wasn't the tricks and the flicks and his general play, which was superb. But when things weren't going well, in difficult places against hard-tackling teams he would stand up. He'd do as much running as anyone, even in his mid-30s. He was just a winner.

'Once, in Washington, I got tackled unfairly and trampled on. Pele decided to wade in and help me out. Before you knew it, there were a couple of Washington players nursing sore jaws. I climbed to my feet when the melee calmed down to find the referee show me the red card. I couldn't believe it.

'I said: "What's going on?" and the referee said: "Steve, I'm sorry, I can't send Pele off, can I?" I smiled because I knew he was right. There were 50,000 people to see him, not me, so I did the walk. This time, he apologised to me and I made him promise not to do it again!

'The Warner Bros connection meant there were always celebrities in the dressing room. Mick Jagger came in one day. Anything to do with rock 'n' roll and I was there. That was my thing.

'One day, in walked Muhammad Ali and hugged Pele. It will stay in my head for as long as I live. Two of the great superhuman sportsmen meeting. To witness that was astonishing. I was in awe.