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The kit of the Peru national football team is the official sports attire of Peru in international association football.
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Due to its long history and wide popular appeal, Peru's football kit has become an unofficial national symbol. The Peru national football team plays in red and white, the country's national colours.
Since 1936, Peru's first-choice kit has been white shirts, white shorts and white socks with a distinctive red "sash" crossing the shirt diagonally from the proper left shoulder to the right hip. This basic scheme has been only slightly altered over the years.
History
Peru's first kit, made for the 1927 South American Championship, comprised a white-and-red striped shirt, white shorts and black socks. According to sports historian Jaime Pulgar-Vidal Otálora, this kit and that worn by Alianza Lima at the time were influenced by the jockey uniforms used in Peruvian President Augusto B. Leguía's stables. The two outfits were identical except Alianza's had blue stripes instead of red. Pulgar-Vidal Otálora suggests that Leguía might have been directly involved in the 1927 uniform's design, citing the fact that different kits were adopted after his overthrow in 1932.
Peru were compelled to use an alternative design in the 1930 World Cup because Paraguay had already registered a kit with white-and-red striped shirts. The Peruvians instead wore white shirts with a red collar, white shorts and black socks.
For the 1935 South American Championship, a horizontal red stripe was added to the shirt.
The following year, at the Berlin Olympics, the team adopted the red sash design it has retained ever since. According to Pulgar-Vidal Otálora, the idea for the diagonal red stripe came from River Plate (a football team from Argentina). More specific alterations
Manufacturers
The Peru national team has had eight official kit manufacturers. The first of these, Adidas, began supplying the team's kit in 1978. Peru have since had contracts with Penalty (1981–82), Adidas (1983–85), Calvo Sportwear (1987), Power (1989–91), Diadora (1991–92), local manufacturer Polmer (1993–95), Umbro (1996–97), and Peruvian company Walon Sport (1998–2010). Umbro have produced the team's kit since 2010.
Popularity
Peru's kit has won praise as one of world football's most attractive designs; Christopher Turpin, the executive producer of NPR's All Things Considered news show, lauded the 1970 iteration in 2010 as "the beautiful game's most beautiful shirt", also commenting that it "was retro even in 1970". The version worn in 1978 came first in a 2010 ESPN list of the "Best World Cup jerseys of all time", described therein as a "simple yet strikingly effective piece of design".
The Peruvian kit allegedly impressed Malcolm Allison so much that he later introduced kits with sashes at Manchester City and Crystal Palace.