Marked for Nika Kvilitaia
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad2 Nov 2026
89 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Merani lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words exchanged at Merani
Doueugui Mala and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ruslan Askerov, and the manager let it.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Nodar Kavtaradze falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Loan watch2 Nov 2026
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Merani, and 0 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Merani will explain it as a decision about the team, and it may well be one. A dressing room has never once read it that way.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad26 Oct 2026
97 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Merani lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad26 Oct 2026
A row about effort at Merani
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Zviad Sikharulia was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad26 Oct 2026
8 new faces, and Merani are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Squad26 Oct 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Merani this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Valer Chachava, and the manager let it.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
Aslan Mutaliev knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Merani, and both men came out saying it was fine.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Window shuts: 17 in, 1 out at Merani
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 17 arrived, 1 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Zviad Sikharulia falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
Sioni have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Not a new contract, not a new number: a new place in the manager’s thinking, which is the only promotion in football that actually matters. Ruslan Askerov has moved up it.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
Aslan Mutaliev knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Aslan Mutaliev trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Nodar Kavtaradze is on it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match8 Aug 2026
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 4‑0 against Shukura, and it could have been more.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
A brace, and Javohir Esonqulov takes the afternoon — 8.99
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Javohir Esonqulov provided it, and the 8.99 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Nodar Kavtaradze, 33, rolls back the years — 8.43
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.43 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Merani have done the hard part with Tskhinvali, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Tempers go at Merani
Zviad Sikharulia was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Market10 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Dato Qazaishvili is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Nika Kvilitaia has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market10 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Bachana Kashia has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market10 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Dato Tsitaishvili has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.