Marked for Nika Kiteishvili
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Transfer targets31 Jan 2028
The deal with Dinamo Tbilisi is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Transfer targets31 Jan 2028
Chikhura asked and Dinamo Batumi said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Giorgi Kukhianidze 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 dugout31 Jan 2028
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Squad31 Jan 2028
Words exchanged at Chikhura
Aleksandre Kvilitaia 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.
Transfer targets31 Jan 2028
Baltika 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.
The dugout31 Jan 2028
Ilia Buzaladze has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Chikhura 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.
The dugout31 Jan 2028
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Davit Gamsakhurdia trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Questions about Nika Kapanadze on the training pitch
The standards have slipped, and in a building where everybody watches everybody it has not gone unremarked. This is how a player loses a place before he loses one.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom3 Jan 2028
Revaz Kvilitaia has until the next board meeting
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Chikhura can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Boardroom3 Jan 2028
Crisis meeting at Chikhura
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
Squad3 Jan 2028
Giorgi Kukhianidze 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.
Squad3 Jan 2028
Pedro Romano 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.
Transfer targets3 Jan 2028
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 dugout3 Jan 2028
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The dugout3 Jan 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Transfer targets3 Jan 2028
Chikhura have made the call to Nacional. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
The dugout3 Jan 2028
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match19 Jun 2027
No end in sight to Chikhura's wait for a win
16 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Chikhura has to find a result from somewhere.
Match19 Jun 2027
Beaten 0‑4 by Lokomotivi, and beaten everywhere it matters. The inquest starts on the training pitch on Monday morning.
Match19 Jun 2027
No clean sheets in sight for Chikhura
8 games now with at least two against. The back line has been rearranged, the goalkeeper has been backed publicly, and the goals keep going in anyway.
Squad21 Jun 2027
6 saves: Aizak Babe was the team
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Transfer targets21 Jun 2027
The deal with San Miguel is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Transfer targets21 Jun 2027
Chikhura had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Zugdidi, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Squad21 Jun 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Nika Kiteishvili and Chikhura agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad21 Jun 2027
Giorgi Kukhianidze 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 dugout21 Jun 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nika Kiteishvili, and the manager let it.