By Jennifer X. Williams

WATCH: Cosmos players thank their moms before Mother's Day match this Sunday

It's been said behind every great man is an even greater woman.

For arguably the greatest soccer player to have ever played the game, that woman is his mom.

Legendary New York Cosmos alum Pelé recently sat down with NYCosmos.com and lit up when discussing his mother, saying "she means everything" to him. The 74-year-old soccer icon couldn't help but gush over her.

"My mother is a fantastic woman,” said Pelé. “She’s always cared about my family and my education, and she taught me how to respect people. She gave me the opportunity to learn how to respect people.”

Interestingly enough, his mother wasn’t always onboard with little Pelé becoming a soccer player. Dona Celeste, who always looked out for her children, saw soccer as both a “dead-end pursuit” and “a sure path to poverty." She wanted Pelé to focus on his studies instead.

“Then as now, she was like the angel sitting on our shoulders, always encouraging us to do the right, moral, constructive thing,” Pelé explains in Why Soccer Matters. “So in those early years, when she caught me playing soccer, she would give me a good verbal lashing. And sometimes much worse!”

But Pelé’s hunger to play fútbol  could not be satiated. And luckily for soccer fans Dona Celeste softened, though she always preached the importance of education.

Pelé left NYCosmos.com with a message for Dona Celeste and for all moms on Mother’s Day.

“I want to take an opportunity to say this to the mothers: I know it is not easy to be a mother, but thank you for doing it.

"And to my mother: God bless you and I love you.”