Georgia on their mind: How a Frenchman, Englishman and local genius are taking Euro 2024 by storm

The ball hits the net, and bearded defensive midfielder Nika Kvekveskiri hesitates for a split-second, almost unwilling to believe the enormity of what he’s just done. The sight of his crazed, jubilant team-mates rushing towards him confirms that, yes, his successful penalty – a perfectly placed right-foot shot that rolls, slow motion-like – is indeed the clincher. Yes, Nika, this really is happening. Yes, Nika, you have just qualified Georgia for a first major tournament.

It’s March 26, 2024, a date to be circled forever more in Georgian history books. The nerveless Kvekveskiri’s spot-kick has secured a 4-2 penalty shootout win for Georgia over Greece, in the play-off final for Euro 2024.

As some of the 44,000 delirious supporters packed into the Boris Paichadze Dinamo Arena in Tbilisi clamber over the barriers to join in the celebrations taking place by the corner flag, others remain in the stands, some hugging the people closest to them, some simply with heads in hands, as they begin to process witnessing history.

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From York to Tbilisi

Three decades after independence from the Soviet Union, and 14 failed attempts to reach World Cups and European Championships, Georgia are on their way to Germany this summer. The closest they’d come was their Euro 2020 play-off final defeat to North Macedonia, held at the same venue in Tbilisi, but left empty because of COVID restrictions. The eerie silence that accompanied that painful failure made such gleeful communion all the sweeter more than three years on.

Back in the dressing room after the game, prime minister Irakli Kobakhidze and Kakha Kaladze, the former Milan defender and now Mayor of Tbilisi, briefly popped in to offer their congratulations. The Georgian premier later announced that the Order of Honour – one of the country’s top civic awards – would be bestowed upon not only the heroic players, but also head coach Willy Sagnol and the Frenchman’s backroom team, plus the entire Georgian Football Federation staff. “History was truly written,” declared Kobakhidze, adding that it was “impossible to convey the feelings and happiness that have united the entire country”.

There have been other important moments throughout Georgia’s football history. Ranking somewhere near the top would be Dinamo Tbilisi’s 1981 European Cup Winners’ Cup Final win over East Germans Carl Zeiss Jena. The more superstitious fans would note that fixture took place in Germany – in front of only 4,751 people in Dusseldorf, given the difficulties of traversing the Iron Curtain back then – in what many will hope is a lucky omen ahead of this summer’s Euro finals.

For 43 years, it was arguably the country’s biggest sporting glory, until March’s double whammy – a 2-0 home win over Luxembourg in the Euro 2024 play-off semis, then the shootout defeat of Greece five days later.

A nation of little more than 3.5 million people, Georgia sit 75th in the FIFA rankings, the lowest placed of the two dozen countries attending this year’s showpiece. They’re the 500-1 outsiders to lift the Henri Delaunay Cup and recent odds gave them a mere six per cent chance of topping Group F ahead of Portugal, Turkey and Czech Republic.

Conversations among the coaching staff about Georgia’s opening-phase matches in Dortmund, Hamburg and Gelsenkirchen “started more or less the day after we beat Greece”, says David Webb, the English coach who’s one of Sagnol’s assistants. However events unfold, the joy of simply being there will mark this group of players forever – in some cases, quite literally.

“I’ll definitely be getting a Euro 2024 logo as my next tattoo, right here on my arm,” Georgia’s captain Guram Kashia tells FFT. The 36-year-old Slovan Bratislava centre-back is his country’s most-capped player, amassing 112 appearances since 2009. Qualifying for the finals has presented the most glorious way of prolonging his career.

“It would have been my final game for Georgia if we’d lost against Greece,” admits Kashia. “Imagine: I’ve waited 15 years for this, and it’s happened – what a story. For many countries, reaching the Euros is normal, but we’ve waited 30 years for this moment.

“The game was 120 minutes of full focus, high concentration. I scream and yell, and coach on the pitch, so mentally I was exhausted. After the game in the dressing room, it was utter chaos, with a lot of family members there, and the prime minister, and Kakha Kaladze as well. In that situation, you have to behave: you can’t really walk around naked in front of the prime minister! We were asking for champagne and whisky – we were on such a high.”

Echoing his prime minister, Kashia believes making it to Euro 2024 has transformed the national mood. “In our country, politics is the number one news story every day, and sometimes it is bleak,” he says.

Recently, a brawl broke out in parliament, with protests on the streets, over a new law with echoes of Russian authoritarianism – Georgia fought a war with Russia in 2008 and are wary of their neighbours. “For the first time in my life, though, after the Greece game, I watched videos of normal people hugging police officers, old people crying in the stadium,” beams skipper Kashia. “We were sharing the moment with each other. It was not ‘the players won’, it was ‘Georgia won’. Young or old, women or men – we were all equally happy. That was the biggest achievement for me.”

Webb joined Georgia’s coaching staff last summer, having first met Sagnol a decade ago on a scouting trip. Technical director positions at Huddersfield and Ostersund in Sweden are on his CV, as well as senior recruitment positions at Bournemouth and Spurs, plus a two-month stint from December 2022 as gaffer of fifth-tier York. The scenes post-Greece were unforgettable.

“There were lots of tears, as it meant the world to the Georgian Federation staff,” says Webb. “The experience of being in Tbilisi was amazing. To be a part of helping the country achieve a historic moment like that… it’s just indescribable. Walking down the street, you’d have people in tears, hugging you, wanting to shake your hand. Heading past a coffee shop, you’d be offered free drinks. It was like a cloud had been lifted.

Fan power

A maiden qualification this may be, though there were signs it was on the horizon. To some degree, Georgia are beneficiaries of the Euros’ expansion from 16 to 24 teams in 2016, but progress was evident nevertheless. Since his appointment three months after the country’s loss in the Euro 2020 play-offs, Sagnol boasts a points-per-game tally that outshines his predecessors. The direction of travel was clear even before that momentous night in March. During Euro 2024 qualifying, Georgia finished fourth in Group A, picking up points at home to Norway and Scotland, a 7-1 home defeat to Spain a notable blot.

“When I got back to Slovan Bratislava after that game, a team-mate had left me a pack of 7UP bottles,” says Kashia with a wry smile, remembering the low point of an ultimately successful campaign. They’d already booked their play-off place after winning a Nations League group containing Bulgaria, Gibraltar and previous conquerors North Macedonia.

During national team camps, coaching is done in English, explains Webb. “Willy speaks really good English and, apart from the odd couple of youngsters coming through, all of the players have a really good grasp of it,” he says. “That’s been helpful for me, as I don’t speak Georgian, or French.”

Sagnol’s elite playing career has had a big impact. The former Bayern Munich right-back bagged 58 caps for France and played every minute at the 2006 World Cup, scoring in Les Bleus’ shootout defeat to Italy in the final. An insight into how to thrive in such moments of high drama and tension has given his players the edge they previously lacked.

“Four years ago, against North Macedonia, we lost because we couldn’t handle the pressure,” says Kashia. “It was my lowest point – it felt like a black mark on my career. In every interview, they’d always mention that you failed. With Georgia, so many times we’ve nearly done something very good, but whenever we’ve been asked to make that final step, we felt the pressure and couldn’t get the job done.

“This time around, we played without pressure and that was thanks to our coach. We wanted to win, we were like hungry dogs, but he lifted all of the pressure from us. We had only one tactical session before the Greece game. Usually, we would have maybe five to 10 meetings. He’s made us more relaxed playing for our country.”

The other significant difference from the previous play-off campaign was fans being allowed in the stadium. Webb insists the Georgian public played a crucial role.

“The support was a major benefit for us,” he reveals. “It was electrifying: literally every time we attacked, the crowd were on their feet, shouting and screaming. Then it was the opposite for Greece – every time they had the ball, there were jeers and boos. Before the match, we were quietly confident that, if it went to penalties, the crowd would become a 12th man for us. When it did, even though it was nerve-racking, you just sensed it was going to be our night. You could feel it was our time. The way the crowd reacted every time we went up to take one… it was like they were blowing the ball into the net.”

Their profile is low, but Georgia is a football country. Many nations attract large crowds for international fixtures, but Georgia did the same when co-hosting the European Under-21 Championship with Romania last year: three times that tournament, Georgia games attracted more than 40,000 fans.

The country’s top division is competitive, too: although it’s ranked below the leagues of Malta and Northern Ireland by UEFA, five different clubs have won the title over the past eight seasons. Sagnol, Webb and staff regularly attend Georgian top-flight fixtures, but the bulk of the squad play abroad.

The XI that started against Greece were based overseas, scattered across leagues from Spain to Saudi Arabia, Poland to England, where Giorgi Chakvetadze has been lining up in Watford’s midfield. Migrating to succeed makes the atmosphere all the more special when they return for international matches, and certain cultural traits remain.

“For our get-togethers, the feeling is one of the players coming home,” continues Webb. “There are different generations within the squad and it’s great to see them together. A lot of success in team sports is down to the strength of the spirit in the dressing room.

“Here it’s a case of ‘you’re the coaching team, we will do as you want us to do.’ Players are equally professional in England and Georgia, it’s just culturally different.”

Kvaratskhelia: The new Hagi?

It helps to have a bona fide superstar in your ranks. Georgia have had top players before – Premier League fans of a certain vintage will recall Manchester City’s twinkle-toed dribbler Georgi Kinkladze in the mid-90s.

“The best Georgian player I’ve ever seen, a Georgian version of Messi,” says Kashia. “He would f**k me if I played him – I like to tackle, but I’d be on my ass cleaning the grass against him! What a player.”

For Newcastle fans, Temuri Ketsbaia was a cult hero, and one of Sagnol’s predecessors, having held down the Georgia national team job from 2009 to 2014. Then there’s the man after whom the national team stadium is named: Boris Paichadze, a prolific goalscorer in the 1930s and ’40s, widely regarded as the best player the country has ever produced. A Georgian has even scored in a Euros final – Slava Metreveli for inaugural champions the USSR in 1960.

It’s far from hyperbole to predict that Khvicha Kvaratskhelia will eclipse them all. The dynamic winger was Serie A’s MVP for 2022-23, thanks to his starring role in Napoli’s thrilling Scudetto victory – Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had allowed him to suspend his contract at Rubin Kazan, moving to Italy in the summer of 2022 via a brief spell back home with Dinamo Batumi.

Kvara’ was also Georgia’s four-goal top scorer during the qualifiers. The 23-year-old’s strike against Spain in November was his 15th for his country, putting him just 11 shy of the all-time high held by ex-Rangers marksman Shota Arveladze. Ahead of the finals, the hope is that he can be a talismanic presence for his nation in the same way Gheorghe Hagi and Hristo Stoichkov proved on the opposite shores of the Black Sea, for Romania and Bulgaria in the 1990s.

Having spent time with the player on the training pitch, Webb says that, though the Dinamo Tbilisi academy graduate’s talent is obvious, it’s witnessing other world-class performers at close quarters that helps most.

“High-level players can perform at that level for a reason – because their standards are exceptionally high, the way they train is exceptionally high,” he says. “They want to do extra before or after training. I think of someone like Son Heung-min or Harry Kane at Tottenham – that work ethic, that desire, almost being machine-like in the way they want to improve. ‘Kvara’ is like that.

“I always find that with the top players, they have that in them. They’re a pleasure to work with. It’s about the success of their careers, how good they can be and how much they challenge themselves each day. It’s like them against them – they’re always wanting to get better.

“He’s a very humble guy, not so outspoken, but he’s more of a leader on the pitch with the players. He’s very inquisitive about his game, so you can have good conversations with him during training. The higher the player’s level, sometimes the easier they are to work with because they can take on board information, adapt and react quicker.”

A nation will relish the moment when the team strides out for their tournament debut against Turkey on June 18. Eight days later, they end the group against Portugal – Kashia says his brother has already told him to ask for Cristiano Ronaldo’s shirt when the two captains swap pennants. “If the last game of my international career is against Ronaldo, I’ll enjoy it,” he adds.

Souvenirs aside, Kashia is quietly confident that Georgia can go further. Historically, this is a tournament that produces its fair share of shocks, and the Crusaders have a solid spine with Valencia’s 23-year-old stopper Giorgi Mamardashvili one of Europe’s most in-demand goalkeepers. “It’s a tough group, but if we play like we did against Greece, why not beat Turkey or Czech Republic?” says centre-back Kashia. “It’s possible to get out of the group in third place, so one win could be enough. We have so much talent in the squad and Kvaratskhelia is one of the best players in the world.”

It’s “all or nothing now”, as Webb puts it, for the senior players. “But even some of the younger ones feel that way,” he says. “They are self-motivated and focused. It means so much to the country. They’re ready to go.”

Independent since 1991, Georgia have had to wait 33 years for this opportunity – they’re going to savour every last second of it.

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