America PE U20

In 1918, four years after a handful of players in Recife registered a side under the name João de Barros, that same club won the Campeonato Pernambucano for the first time — and would win it again the following year, then in 1921 and 1922, a run of four titles inside five seasons that no rival in the state matched at the time. By then it had already taken the name América, and the green and white shirts, along with the nickname Mequinha, dated from those early years. A fifth title followed in 1927 and a sixth in 1944.

What América-PE has done since has been to defend a place among the state's traditional four clubs — alongside Sport Recife, Santa Cruz and Náutico — largely on the strength of that early record. The Troféu Nordeste came in 1923, still inside the club's first golden stretch, while the Taça Recife (1975) and the Torneio Incentivo Pernambucano (1976) belong to a much later and more modest period. The Clássico da Estrada do Arraial, the derby against Sport, carries the weight of that older rivalry more than of recent form.

The club left Recife itself some time ago and now plays out of Paulista, at the Estádio Municipal Ademir Cunha, a ground that holds up to 12,000.