From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match19 Aug 2026
The cup run ends for Lokomotivi
0‑2 against Telavi, and the road stops here. Cup exits are quick deaths — no second leg, no next week, just the league from now until May.
Market24 Aug 2026
Dennis Amoako hands in a written request
“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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Yuta Nakano arrives at the club he grew up with
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Yuta Nakano has, at Lokomotivi, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad24 Aug 2026
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 targets24 Aug 2026
The deal with Dynamo Kyiv 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 targets24 Aug 2026
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Dynamo Kyiv is saying, and nobody at Lokomotivi is enjoying the guessing.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Luka Nozadze and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Gareji Sagarejo have kept their man, and Lokomotivi go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad24 Aug 2026
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 Aug 2026
Laurenţiu Brănescu and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Lokomotivi asked and PAEEK said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Vasil Khositashvili 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.
Market17 Aug 2026
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Dionathã needs a bigger stage
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Lokomotivi know which stage they are at.
Market17 Aug 2026
Lokomotivi and Renan are talking past each other
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
A loan move for Dragoljub Savić is in the works
Lokomotivi have made the call to Neftchi. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Lokomotivi have made the call to Dynamo Kyiv. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Market17 Aug 2026
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Lokomotivi has been clear about where Aleksandre Turkia stands, which is more than many ever get.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
Everything agreed with Viktoria Plzen, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Renan in a row with a teammate
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.
Transfer targets10 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Davit Kvilitaia 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
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Khvicha 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
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Temur Qazaishvili 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
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Aleksandre Ananidze 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Renan needs a bigger stage
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Lokomotivi know which stage they are at.
Squad10 Aug 2026
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Vasil Khositashvili and Lokomotivi agree another 2 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Dennis Amoako 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 targets3 Aug 2026
Lokomotivi asked and Neftchi said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad3 Aug 2026
A row about effort at Lokomotivi
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vasil Khositashvili was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad3 Aug 2026
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Lokomotivi know which stage they are at.
Market3 Aug 2026
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
Market3 Aug 2026
49 months to run and not a word offered. A club that lets the calendar negotiate for it usually ends up losing to the calendar.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
A loan move for Matyáš Šilhavý is in the works
Lokomotivi have made the call to Viktoria Plzen. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Market3 Aug 2026
Dachi Gogol is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Lokomotivi has been clear about where Dachi Gogol stands, which is more than many ever get.