Marked for Bachana Mikautadze
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad1 Nov 2027
Jemal Tabidze 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.
Squad1 Nov 2027
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. Nikoloz Ugrekhelidze has moved up it.
Squad1 Nov 2027
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Saburtalo has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Market1 Nov 2027
The name of Beka Dartsmelia keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Saburtalo say nothing, which says plenty.
The dugout1 Nov 2027
Nobody at Saburtalo will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Squad1 Nov 2027
“I will know when it is time. I am not there yet.” Jon McLaughlin is 40, with 421 appearances behind him, and Saburtalo will have to plan for whichever answer comes.
The dugout1 Nov 2027
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Saburtalo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout1 Nov 2027
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Saburtalo. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Market1 Nov 2027
Saburtalo have let the market know Bachana Mikautadze can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad13 Sep 2027
Keven Samuel breaks a bone — 49 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 49 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad13 Sep 2027
Davit Chakvetadze damages knee ligaments — 18 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 18 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Match11 Sep 2027
4‑1, and Budu Zivzivadze took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Saburtalo tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Squad13 Sep 2027
He is 15, he is averaging 6.54, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Market13 Sep 2027
Chuck puts it in writing
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Saburtalo, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad13 Sep 2027
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Player ratings13 Sep 2027
Budu Zivzivadze, 33, rolls back the years — 9.70
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.70 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Player ratings13 Sep 2027
Keny Arroyo, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.27
A mark of 8.27 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Match11 Sep 2027
Still nobody has beaten Saburtalo
The unbeaten run reaches 9. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings19 Apr 2027
Successful dribbles: 27. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Match17 Apr 2027
Nobody wants to play Saburtalo right now
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Beka Dartsmelia and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The terraces19 Apr 2027
At 15 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Match17 Apr 2027
A 1‑0 win over Shukura, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings19 Apr 2027
Marked 8.24 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Levan Kobiashvili could afford to be generous.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
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 Beka Dartsmelia is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad18 Jan 2027
Irakli Azarovi and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
Saburtalo asked and Samtredia said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
A loan move for Kisley Zita is in the works
Saburtalo have made the call to Torpedo Kutaisi. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
Zugdidi 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.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
A loan enquiry to Merani: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
Squad18 Jan 2027
A wage question at Saburtalo
David Cornell has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
Squad18 Jan 2027
A season on the outside for Daniel Suško
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Saburtalo has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
The clubs have shaken hands with Dinamo Batumi; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
A defender's goal wins it for Saburtalo — 7.95
1 for Ibrahim Alhassan, marked 7.95, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 25. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Market31 Aug 2026
The fee is $790.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Dinamo Tbilisi drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
No thanks: Kayke rejects the move
Saburtalo had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Corinthians, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Jemal Tabidze and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Dinamo Tbilisi wanted more than $240.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Transfer targets31 Aug 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.
The terraces31 Aug 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Vakho Bedoshvili has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.