As a football fan I read how Fascist Italy tried to destroy such city factionalism in Italy, forcefully merging different football clubs from one city into a single team to avoid rivalries forming inside cities.
For example Fiorentina and Roma were created for this reason.
For example Fiorentina and Roma were created for this reason.
The fascists in Italy recognized how the increasing popularity of football and local football clubs was reviving the ancient factionalism inside some Italian cities and they felt that this was disrupting the unity needed for their authoritarian ideology.
That's why they tried to forcefully create a situation where every city would have a single strong club, merging the smaller clubs if needed.
In Florence there was a big rivalry between Firenze FC and PGF Libertas and the fascists just merged them into AC Fiorentina.
In Florence there was a big rivalry between Firenze FC and PGF Libertas and the fascists just merged them into AC Fiorentina.
In Rome they did the same thing merging Roman FC, SS Alba-Audace and Fortitudo-Pro Roma SGS into AS Roma.
The only big Roman team which successfully resisted this was SS Lazio, giving birth to the fierce Lazio-Roma rivalry that still exists today.
The only big Roman team which successfully resisted this was SS Lazio, giving birth to the fierce Lazio-Roma rivalry that still exists today.
This is an interesting map showing distribution of Roma and Lazio fans in Rome, with each having specific neighborhoods as strongholds.
But medieval Italian Palio rivalries between different city districts would probably be the most comparable to modern football rivalries in London and Buenos Aires because there are so many different popular football clubs there spread around different parts of the city.
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