Georgia national football team

The history of the Georgia national football team began in 1990, when the team played their first international match against Lithuania, the first country to accept an invitation. The match was held on 27 May 1990 at national stadium. Georgia were coached by Givi Nodia. The friendly match ended in a 2–2 draw. This was the only match prior to the declaration of independence on 9 April 1991. Soon afterwards the team played another friendly match against Moldova.

The Georgian Football Federation became a member of both UEFA and FIFA in 1992,[2] enabling Georgia to play competitive matches. The first of these came in September 1994, a 1–0 defeat to Moldova[3] as part of the qualifiers for Euro 1996. Georgia finished third in their group, ahead of Moldova, Wales and Albania, but seven points behind second-placed qualifier Bulgaria.

Georgia failed to qualify for 1998 FIFA World Cup in France, obtaining 10 points and finishing in fourth place, level on points with Poland. At this time Georgia reached forty-second place in the FIFA World Ranking.

During UEFA Euro 2000 qualifying the Georgia national team won one match, drew two and finished at the bottom of the group with five points. This marked the beginning of a period of decline for Georgian football.

The team finished fifth (and last) with seven points in their qualifying group for Euro 2004, although they defeated Russia with a goal scored by Malkhaz Asatiani.

In the 2006 FIFA World Cup qualifiers Georgia beat Albania 2–0 at home and Kazakhstan away 2–1. They finished sixth (second bottom) with ten points in Group 2.

Georgia were sixth out of seven teams in the UEFA Euro 2008 qualifying group with ten points. They defeated Scotland 2–0 at home and the Faroe Islands 6–0 away and 3–1 at home.

Héctor Cúper became the manager of Georgia in August 2008. During the qualification round for the 2010 FIFA World Cup Georgia failed to win any matches and finished sixth (and last) with three points. Cuper didn't extend his contract, and on 6 November 2009 Temur Ketsbaia was appointed as the new manager of the Georgian national football team. Ketsbaia resigned as manager after a 4–0 defeat at home to Poland in the UEFA Euro 2016 qualifiers on 14 November 2014, having previously stated he would do so before the match regardless of the result.

In June 2016, Georgia beat the two-times reigning European champions Spain 1–0 in their final pre-Euro 2016 friendly.[4]

In 2018, they were the first team to earn promotion in the new UEFA Nations League. They scored the event's first goal in a UEFA Nations League D game in Kazakhstan before beating Latvia twice and Andorra, with 2 games still to spare. In the UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying, Georgia had a disappointing run, with their only wins came over Gibraltar. Still, having finished first place in League D, Georgia was able to qualify for the country's first ever major playoff. Georgia managed to beat Belarus 1–0 and thus the hope to qualify for UEFA Euro 2020 increased, but it went in vain after the Georgians suffered a heartbreaking home defeat to North Macedonia in the decisive match and thus missed the opportunity to make a historic debut in a major competition.

Georgia showed improvements with a strong 2-0 win over Sweden at the 2022 World Cup qualification on 11 November, 2021.[5]

As of 15 February 2021

Position	Name
Manager	Willy Sagnol
Assistant Manager	Adel Chedli
Assistant Manager	Zurab Khizanishvili
Goalkeeping Coach	Davit Gvaramadze
Fitness Coach	Fabien Bossuet
Chief Analyst	Giorgi Chitauri

Coaching history

As of 19 November 2019[6]

Manager	Georgia career	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	Win %
Givi Nodia	1990	1	0	1	0	000.00
Giga Norakidze	1991–1992	4	2	0	2	050.00
Aleksandre Chivadze	1993–1996	24	9	1	14	037.50
Vladimir Gutsaev (caretaker)	1996	2	0	0	2	000.00
David Kipiani	1997	7	4	1	2	057.14
Vladimir Gutsaev	1998	5	3	2	0	060.00
Gigla Imnadze (caretaker)	1998	1	0	0	1	000.00
Vladimir Gutsaev	1998–1999	8	2	1	5	025.00
Johan Boskamp	1999	5	0	1	4	000.00
David Kipiani / Revaz Dzodzuashvili	2000–2001	16	5	5	6	031.25
Aleksandre Chivadze	2001–2003	11	4	3	4	036.36
Ivo Šušak	2003	2	1	0	1	050.00
Merab Jordania	2003	3	1	0	2	033.33
Gocha Tkebuchava (caretaker)	2004	3	0	0	3	000.00
Alain Giresse	2004–2005	10	2	2	6	020.00
Gaioz Darsadze (caretaker)	2005	7	2	2	3	028.57
Klaus Toppmöller	2006–2008	24	7	4	13	029.17
Petar Segrt (caretaker)	2008	2	0	1	1	000.00
Héctor Cúper	2008–2009	16	1	4	11	006.25
Temur Ketsbaia	2010–2014	40	13	9	18	032.50
Kakhaber Tskhadadze	2014–2016	10	3	1	6	030.00
Vladimír Weiss	2016–2020	47	16	15	16	034.04
Ramaz Svanadze (caretaker)	2020–2021	1	0	1	0	000.00
Willy Sagnol	2021-	4	1	1	2	025.00

As of 11 November 2021[8]

Players in bold are still active with Georgia.

As of 15 November 2021[9][10]

Opponents	P	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Win %
Albania	14	8	3	3	23	13	+10	057.14
Andorra	2	1	1	0	4	1	+3	050.00
Armenia	7	3	2	2	14	8	+6	042.86
Austria	2	0	1	1	2	3	−1	000.00
Azerbaijan	6	2	2	2	8	6	+2	033.33
Belarus	4	2	1	1	4	4	+0	050.00
Bulgaria	5	1	1	3	6	15	−9	020.00
Cameroon	1	0	1	0	0	0	+0	000.00
Croatia	3	1	0	2	3	4	−1	033.33
Cyprus	6	2	1	3	6	7	−1	033.33
Denmark	5	0	2	3	5	15	−10	000.00
Egypt	1	0	1	0	0	0	+0	000.00
England	2	0	0	2	0	4	−4	000.00
Estonia	8	4	2	2	9	7	+2	050.00
Faroe Islands	2	2	0	0	9	1	+8	100.00
Finland	2	0	1	1	1	2	−1	000.00
France	4	0	1	3	1	7	−6	000.00
Germany	5	0	0	5	2	12	−10	000.00
Gibraltar	4	4	0	0	13	2	+11	100.00
Greece	8	0	2	6	6	15	−9	000.00
Hungary	2	1	0	1	4	5	−1	050.00
Iceland	1	0	0	1	1	3	−2	000.00
Iran	1	0	0	1	1	2	−1	000.00
Israel	6	1	2	3	4	7	−3	016.67
Italy	8	0	1	7	2	14	−12	000.00
Jordan	2	1	0	1	3	3	+0	050.00
Kazakhstan	6	3	2	1	7	4	+3	050.00
Kosovo	2	1	0	1	2	2	+0	050.00
Latvia	10	5	2	3	18	10	+8	050.00
Lebanon	2	0	0	2	4	7	−3	000.00
Liechtenstein	1	1	0	0	2	0	+2	100.00
Lithuania	8	4	1	3	13	6	+7	050.00
Luxembourg	4	2	1	1	5	2	+3	050.00
Malta	9	6	2	1	12	5	+7	066.67
Moldova	12	4	4	4	17	14	+3	033.33
Montenegro	2	0	1	1	1	2	−1	000.00
Netherlands	1	0	0	1	0	3	−3	000.00
New Zealand	1	0	0	1	1	3	−2	000.00
Nigeria	1	0	0	1	1	5	−4	000.00
Northern Ireland	1	0	0	1	1	4	−3	000.00
North Macedonia	4	0	2	2	2	4	−2	000.00
Norway	3	0	0	3	1	6	−5	000.00
Paraguay	1	0	0	1	0	1	−1	000.00
Poland	5	1	0	4	4	13	−9	020.00
Portugal	1	0	0	1	0	2	−2	000.00
Qatar	1	1	0	0	2	1	+1	100.00
Republic of Ireland	11	0	2	9	5	18	−13	000.00
Romania	8	1	2	5	6	20	−14	012.50
Russia	3	1	1	1	3	4	−1	033.33
Saudi Arabia	1	1	0	0	2	0	+2	100.00
Scotland	4	2	0	2	4	3	+1	050.00
Saint Kitts and Nevis	1	1	0	0	3	0	+3	100.00
Serbia	2	0	0	2	1	4	−3	000.00
Slovakia	2	1	0	1	3	3	+0	050.00
Slovenia	4	1	1	2	4	5	−1	025.00
South Africa	1	1	0	0	4	1	+3	100.00
South Korea	1	0	1	0	2	2	+0	000.00
Spain	4	1	0	3	2	5	−3	025.00
Sweden	2	1	0	1	2	1	+1	050.00
Switzerland	4	0	1	3	1	7	−6	000.00
Tunisia	2	1	1	0	3	1	+2	050.00
Turkey	5	1	1	3	5	12	−7	020.00
United Arab Emirates	1	0	0	1	0	1	−1	000.00
Ukraine	9	0	3	6	6	16	−10	000.00
Uruguay	1	1	0	0	2	0	+2	100.00
Uzbekistan	2	1	1	0	3	2	+1	050.00
Wales	5	3	1	1	9	3	+6	060.00
Total: 67 countries	257	79	54	124	293	358	−65	030.74

• Football in Georgia
• List of Georgia international footballers
• Georgia national football team results
• List of Georgian national football team captains
• Georgia national under-21 football team
• Georgia national under-19 football team
• Georgia national under-17 football team
• Georgia national futsal team
• Georgia national beach soccer team

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Georgia national football team.

• Georgian Football Federation
• FIFA profile
• UEFA profile
• RSSSF archive of results 1990–
• RSSSF archive of most capped players and highest goalscorers
• Archive of results 1990–