Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Dila will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Paralimni had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Dila is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Blankson Anoff 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 Zurab Museliani is on it.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 39 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Giorgi Jalaghonia will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Dila the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 8 signed and 5 gone
That is the business done at Dila until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
The phone has started ringing about Mohamed Kanté again, and this time the name on the line is Bunyodkor. Dila are listening politely and promising nothing.
Dila had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Alashkert, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 48 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Dila people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Dila had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Omonoia, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Blankson Anoff 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.
The phone has started ringing about Claude Kouakou again, and this time the name on the line is Lokomotivi. Dila are listening politely and promising nothing.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Badri Gogoberishvili was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 57 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Chikhura waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Dila is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The offer from Torpedo Kutaisi for Shota Shekiladze 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.
Shota Shekiladze 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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 65 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The offer from Torpedo Kutaisi for Tedo Kikabidze 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.
Shota Shekiladze 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 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. Lasha Kvaratskhelia 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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Dila are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Dila have made the call to Dinamo Batumi. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Daniel Suško is in the works
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Dila will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
He will be fined, he will apologise, and he will play on Saturday. The order of those three tells you everything about what a football club actually values.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Batumi have kept their man, and Dila go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
A loan enquiry to Dinamo Tbilisi: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
20 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Dila lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 79 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Blankson Anoff 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 a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
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.
In brief
The dugoutMohamed Kanté knocks on the manager’s door
28 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Dila lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 87 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Blankson Anoff 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody at Dila 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Dila know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
35 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Dila lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Dila will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Khvicha Gvelesiani 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Shota Gvelesiani 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Badri Gogoberishvili 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 42 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 102 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Blankson Anoff 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.
Giorgi Gvasalia 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.
50 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Dila lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Dila will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
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.
58 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Dila lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Dila will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Shota Shekiladze 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 am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Dila, and 4 appearances in 12 say he has earned the hearing.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Badri Gogoberishvili 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 at Dila 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Dila know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alioune Tall trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Dila will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Blankson Anoff was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Zurab Museliani is on 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 Dila, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Dila know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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. Mikheil Kvaratskhelia 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 no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Saba Mikautadze 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.
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.
Giorgi Gvasalia 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
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.
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 has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Nikoloz Mali signs something — a contract at Dila or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Blankson Anoff 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 Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
15 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
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 Giorgi Tsetskhladze is on it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Dila know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at Dila 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.
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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Dila, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Giorgi Chakvetadze 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Nika Shengelia is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
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.
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 Alioune Tall is on 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 Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
Nobody at Dila 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Nikoloz Mali signs something — a contract at Dila or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Dila than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
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.
15 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
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 Giorgi Tsetskhladze is on it.
In brief
The dugoutPedro Beda asks for a word with the manager
Shota Shekiladze 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Uruguay Montevideo have kept their man, and Dila go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
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 Zurab Museliani is on it.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Avtandil Gvelesiani after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The team at the top of the table next, and the honest measure of where this side actually is. Anybody can beat the club below them; the question is what happens against Dinamo Batumi.
1 kept out from twelve yards, and a stadium that will describe each of them for twenty years. A goalkeeper needs one night like this in a career, and this was it.
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.
Giorgi Gvasalia 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Lasha Kakabadze is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
It was his to settle and he did not settle it. A long walk back to the halfway line, and a considerably longer week.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑3 defeat, delivered by Avtandil Gvelesiani to a room that had heard them before.
Successful dribbles: 27. 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.
Dealt with internally, which is the phrase a club uses when it would rather nobody asked twice. He will be fined, he will apologise, and he will play on Saturday.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 17 arrived, 3 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Blankson Anoff 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 Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Dila will try again when the window opens; Guria may not be selling by then.
7 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Shota Shekiladze provided it, and the 9.34 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The offer from Ermis for Mohamed Kanté 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.
Dila and Guria have settled on $37.0K. 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 22 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Shota Shekiladze. 2‑0 against Shukura, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Giorgi Tsetskhladze obliged against Saburtalo. 2‑1 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Dila.
126 minutes played. Giorgi Tsetskhladze found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Saburtalo went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Two goals and a mark of 8.50 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
6 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Shota Shekiladze 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.
Shukura paid $150.0K and Dila took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
In brief
SquadBlankson Anoff falls out with a teammate over standards
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Lasha Menteshashvili obliged against Sioni. 3‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Dila.
A mark of 7.69 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 17-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Dinamo Tbilisi have accepted the money. What Dila do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $610.0K has been paid because Giorgi Kavtaradze is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Shukura had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Torpedo Kutaisi have kept their man, and Dila go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Dila have gone to Shukura 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.
$19.0K on the table at Dinamo Tbilisi. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Marked 8.80 — 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Shota Shekiladze provided it, and the 9.26 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.96 for the rest of it.
Dila have gone to Torpedo Kutaisi 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dila this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Blankson Anoff 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.
Dila asked and Pyunik said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.