In the 1970s, the famous Brazilian football player Pele (1)____________________of Brazil and became a professional player for a team in New York. Football, or soccer, wasn’t very popular in the United States at that time.
Few North Americans knew anything about this fast-moving sport. There was (2)____________________and there was little interest in football in high schools and colleges.
When Pele and other international stars began playing in various US cities, (3)______________________was and began to go to the matches. It is now common for important games to have fifty to sixty thousand fans.