Cavalheiros em uniforme. Futebol, nacionalismo e rivalidade ritualizada entre Peru e Chile, 1932-1933

Objective: To historically analyze how, during the early 1930s, a football rivalry between Peru and Chile was consolidated, combining elements of sporting competition and gestures of diplomatic rapprochement, promoted through the symbolic field of sport. Methodology: Using primary (press from both countries) and secondary sources, the study employs the historical method and documentary review to analyze how Colo Colo's international tours functioned as catalysts for national discourses about playing style, allowing the Peruvian press to construct an image of its own football identity vis-à-vis the Chilean press. Originality: The article provides a little-explored perspective on this rivalry before the first official match between their national teams. Thus, it proposes the concept of “gentlemanly amateurism” as a key to understanding the sporting ethos of the period and examines how journalistic discourse not only chronicled but also shaped a style of play valued aesthetically and as a form of identity by fans. Conclusions: Soccer operated as a space for paradiplomacy, promoting symbolic reconciliation after the signing of the Treaty of Lima; however, this reconciliation did not eliminate tensions, but rather reconfigured them in a ritualized manner. The study reveals how sports discourses can convey narratives of national identity that endure over time.