Lokomotivi and Dinamo Batumi have settled on $980.0K. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
Lokomotivi 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.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Words at Lokomotivi training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vasil Khositashvili is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Boniphanseo Phiri 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Lokomotivi has been clear about where Davi stands, which is more than many ever get.
Marked 7.21 on 11 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
10 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Torpedo Kutaisi go through and Lokomotivi go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Lokomotivi can pretend not to have heard.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Giorgi Gogatishvili is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Everything agreed with Samtredia, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
$880.0K was the most the club would pay and Torpedo Kutaisi were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Lokomotivi have gone to Dinamo Tbilisi with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
1 for David Asayure, marked 7.20, 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.
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.
Boniphanseo Phiri 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.
Minute 95, against Dinamo Tbilisi, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
Guilherme Escuro 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Thiago Rodrigues was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Lokomotivi can tell you which week it ends in.
“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.
The dugout17 May 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑2 Vakhtang Ananidze left the room before anybody could ask which.
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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Lokomotivi, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Lokomotivi can pretend not to have heard.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Aleksandre Turkia provided it, and the 8.73 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Guilherme Escuro 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.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at Lokomotivi training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thiago Rodrigues is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“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.
The dugout26 Apr 2027
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Vakhtang Ananidze, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Lokomotivi, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lokomotivi have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Successful dribbles: 24. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Lokomotivi know it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lokomotivi this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Archil Okriashvili 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.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Lucas Black was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lokomotivi this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Lokomotivi are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Lokomotivi. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
The deal with Slovan Liberec 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.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Bahia keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Aleksandre Turkia 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Talisson
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Davi is living that version at Lokomotivi, and it tends to show in the first month.
The offer from Guria for Aleksandre Turkia was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Lucas 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Lokomotivi training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thiago Rodrigues is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Lasha Mchedlidze 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Levan Kobiashvili is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Lasha Kobiashvili 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Lokomotivi know it, and so does everybody who watches him.