Alianza Lima

The club was founded under the name of Sport Alianza on 15 February 1901 by working-class youth in the Chacaritas neighborhood of Lima. The Alianza name was in reference to the Alianza Racing Horse Stud, where their first matches were played. The stud was located on the same street, Cotabambas, in Lima

The club is one of the oldest professional football teams in Peru. It was founded on 15 February 1901, as Sport Alianza, named for the stable that hosted its first games. It is the only surviving founding member of the Peruvian Football League, created as an amateur level league in 1912. The club's first kit was green and white, honoring founding member Eduardo Pedreschi's Italian heritage. Beginning in that first season, the colors of the Alianza stables, blue, white and black were used, and by the 1920s the classic vertically striped jersey had become the definitive kit. The club changed its name to Alianza Lima in 1920. The League turned professional in 1951.

Alianza participated in the amateur era of the Peruvian football league from that inaugural season, winning its first title in 1918. During its first years, it played irregularly against other teams from Lima and the port of Callao. Its matches against Atlético Chalaco from Callao stirred interest as a clash between limeños and chalacos. Sport Alianza had started to become a popular team drawing large support and this was the first derby or "clasico".

The Alianza Stud changed owners and locations continuously and, consequently, the team was forced to relocate in turn, until 1928, when under the new name Alianza Lima, the club settled at the third block of the Manco Capac avenue in the La Victoria District, where it would stay and become the emotional home-base for club and fans alike.

That same year Alianza played against the Federación Universitaria (University Federation) for the first time. This club which would later be renamed Universitario de Deportes and become Alianza's greatest rivals, in what is today the most important Peruvian derby.

The 1930s brought great joy and frustration to the team. In 1931, 1932, 1933, and 1934, Alianza Lima won the National Championship four times in a row, for the first and so far only time in Peruvian football. However the Peruvian Football Federation did not recognize the championship of 1934 as won by Alianza. The championship was awarded to the club's biggest rival, Universitario.

The memory of the four-in-a-row was tainted by the club's relegation in 1938, but after one season in the Lima Provincial League, one of the de facto first division leagues, the team returned to the First Division.

During the 1940s, and start of the professional era in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, Alianza would win 10 championships. The club won two Peruvian titles in a row in 1977 and 1978, when its players formed the majority of the Peru national football team. The team had its greatest success at the international level in the 1976 and 1978 Copa Libertadores, in which managed to reach the semi-finals but lost to Deportivo Cali 1–4. Since then, its Copa Libertadores campaigns were not successful, during the 1990s the club managed to reach round of 16 several times including a semi-finals participation in the 1999 Conmebol's Copa Merconorte losing to penalty shootout against Colombian side America de Cali the same way it had been defeated by Uruguay's Peñarol a year before in the 1998 Copa Libertadores. Then had one of its worst campaigns in 2007, until the 2010 edition, when they did a great campaign even defeating the defending champion Estudiantes de la Plata by 4–1 in Lima, being one of the three top teams at the end of the first round however, in the Round of 16, they lost the chance to advance further with Universidad de Chile, after a controversial match in Chile, where Ecuadorian referee Carlos Vera gave the Chilean side a goal that had already been flagged by the sideline referee as offside and the play had been called off, however Universidad de Chile's coaching staff including teammates and the pressure of a large local crowd seem to have given referee Carlos Vera the fast initiative to validate the goal, Alianza Lima had been eliminated in what Peruvian media and other South American media believed to be a robbery, Fox Sports network and ESPN agreed the play should not have been validated, Alianza Lima's president Guillermo Alarcon flew to Asuncion, Paraguay to speak to Conmebol and claiming a straight entry to the next Copa Libertadores, the case was also taken to FIFA headquarters but was not approved.

In the 2011 preliminary phase of the Copa Libertadores Alianza Lima came into the tournament as Peru's 3rd place having to face Mexico's Jaguares de Chiapas in a back to back home and away matches for a pass to the Cup's group stage but would lose both games 2–0 and lost a chance to participate . This 2012 version of the Copa Libertadores, Alianza Lima will participate in group 5 as Peru's No. 2 seed against Nacional (Uruguay), Vasco da Gama (Brazil) and the winner of Ecuador's 3rd and Paraguay's 3rd.

The 1980s were probably the most bitter years in the club's history. During the first years of the decade, despite having very good players, Alianza could not obtain titles, some which were snatched by Sporting Cristal, which was establishing itself as one of the three big football clubs of Peru.

In 1987, Alianza Lima was first in the standings with a few matches left. On 8 December of that year, Alianza made a trip to Pucallpa to play against Deportivo Pucallpa for the league. The match was won 1–0, with Carlos Bustamante scoring. The team took a charter flight for the trip back. The flight departed on 8 December in a Peruvian Navy Fokker F27 airplane, which crashed into the sea when it was a few kilometers away from the Lima-Callao Airport, close to the Ventanilla district in Callao. The only survivor was the pilot, all the players and coaching staff died, being a game away from conquering another title.

Alianza finished the championship playing with members of the youth team and a few players on loan from Chile club Colo-Colo, which had offered to help sending four players (José Letelier, Parko Quiroz, Francisco Huerta and René Pinto). Friendship between both clubs has been strong since then. Alianza could not keep the first place and its greatest rival, Universitario de Deportes, obtained the title.

The team had to restart from scratch and even former players who had already retired, like Teófilo Cubillas, or others who were about to, like César Cueto, played to help the club get out of these bitter times.

Alianza Lima was close to relegation in 1988, but it managed to hold on in the last matches. In the next few years, despite being competitive, it failed to obtain a title.

In 1997, Alianza Lima obtained its first title after 18 years, under Colombian manager Jorge Luis Pinto. In 1999 it came in second place, after losing to Universitario in the finals. In the early hours 2000, tragedy struck again when young captain Sandro Baylón died in a car accident after crashing with a post while driving under the influence of alcohol.

In 2001 the club celebrated its centenary and obtained the national title after beating Cienciano in Cusco on penalty kicks. Later on, Alianza Lima would win the 2003 and 2004 championships, defeating Sporting Cristal in both finals, this time under Argentinian manager Gustavo Costas. In 2006 Alianza Lima again won the championship beating Cienciano del Cusco in the final play-off, enabling them to play the Copa Libertadores. In 2017, Alianza Lima won its first championship in over a decade by winning both the Apertura and Clausura and, thus, did not require playing in the final playoffs. Along with Sporting Cristal, Alianza Lima has been the most successful Peruvian club in this century, having won five championships.

At the end of 2020, Alianza was relegated to the second division, despite the fact that in that year all games were played in just Lima and Callao because of the COVID-19 epidemic and teams from the provinces were not able to use their home stadiums. As soon as the season ended, Alianza launched a campaign to try to remain in the first division. There was contention about the team that had finished one place above Alianza, Carlos Stein. The Peruvian FA gave them a fine. Alianza argued that this was not enough, since Alianza's interpretation of the regulation was that they should be docked points. The Peruvian Football Association disagreed explaining that both fines and point reductions were allowed and used with other teams during the competition depending on the level of infraction by the team, and confirmed Alianza's relegation. Then, Alianza took their case all the way to Switzerland, to the International Court of Arbitration for Sport. Eventually CAS decided in favor of Alianza and the team was returned to the first division and Carlos Stein sent to the second division despite the fact that the new season (2021) had already kicked off, and Carlos Stein had played a match.

Eventually, the regular 2021 season ended with a two legged play off against Sporting Cristal. Alianza beat Sporting Cristal in the first game 1-0 and tied the second game 0–0 to become the champions for 2021. Carlos Stein, meanwhile, came through a penalty shoot out at the end of a play off in the second division and won promotion back to the first division again for 2022. ^[]

Alianza Lima finished in fourth place for the 2022 Torneo Apertura and first in the Torneo Clausura. Due to coming in second in the aggregate table, they received a bye in the semi-finals of the championship playoffs. Melgar beat Sporting Crystal 2–0 in each leg, coming out 4–0 winners on aggregate to set up a showdown with Alianza Lima for the 2022 Liga 1 title. The first leg was played in Melgar's stadium in Arequipa and Alianza lost 1-0 due to a Yordi Vílchez own goal. Yordi Vílchez made up for it by tying the series on aggregate with a header right before halftime in the second leg. Pablo Lavandeira then popped up to score a header of his own in the 74th minute to give Alianza a 2-1 aggregate lead. They held on to that lead and won back-to-back league titles for the first time since their 2003 and 2004 league title triumphs. This was, according to Peru's official records, Alianza Lima's 25th league title win, while Alianza will refute that this was their 26th. This was also their seventh title since the turn of the century, a record only matched by Crystal. In 2023, defending champions Alianza lost to historic rivals Universitario de Deportes in the final, 3–1 on aggregate.