Georgia national football team

Infobox National football team
Name = Georgia
Badge = Georgia_football_association.gif
FIFA Trigramme = GEO
Nickname = "Jvarosnebi" (Crusaders)
Association = Georgian Football Federation
Confederation = UEFA (Europe)
Coach = flagicon|Argentina Héctor Cúper
Captain = Kakhaber Kaladze
Most caps = Levan Kobiashvili (71)
Top scorer = Shota Arveladze (21)
Home Stadium = Boris Paichadze Stadium
FIFA Rank = 97
1st ranking date = March 1994
FIFA max = 42
FIFA max date = September 1998
FIFA min = 156
FIFA min date = March 1994

Elo Rank = 89
Elo max = 48
Elo max date = 1998
pattern_la1=_whiteupper|pattern_b1=_vneckred|pattern_ra1=_whiteupper
leftarm1=FF1412|body1=FFFFFF|rightarm1=FF1412|shorts1=FF1412|socks1=FFFFFF
pattern_la2=_whitelines|pattern_b2=_vneckwhite|pattern_ra2=_whitelines
leftarm2=FF1212|body2=FF1212|rightarm2=FF1212|shorts2=FFFFFF|socks2=FF1212

First game = flagicon|Georgia|1990 Georgia 2 - 2 fb-rt|Lithuania (Tbilisi, Georgia; May 27, 1990)
Largest win = flagicon|Georgia|1990 Georgia 7 - 0 fb-rt|Armenia (Tbilisi, Georgia; March 30, 1997)
Largest loss = fb|Romania 5 - 0 Georgia flagicon|Georgia|1990 (Bucharest, Romania; April 24, 1996)
fb|Denmark 6 - 1 Georgia Flagicon|Georgia (Copenhagen, Denmark; September 7, 2005)
World cup apps =
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World cup best =
Regional name = European Championship
Regional cup apps =
Regional cup first =
Regional cup best =

The Georgia national football team is the national football team of Georgia and is controlled by the Georgian Football Federation. The Georgian team's first match took place in 1990, while Georgia was still part of the Soviet Union. The team have attempted to qualify for each major tournament from Euro 96 onwards, but have not yet achieved qualification.

Georgia's home games are played at the Boris Paichadze Stadium in Tblisi.

History

Prior to 1990, Georgian players played for the USSR national football team. The first match played by the Georgian national team occurred while Georgia was still part of the Soviet Union, when they played Lithuania on May 27, 1990, a match which ended in a 2-2 draw.cite web | title=Georgia - International Results| work=RSSSF | url=http://www.rsssf.com/tablesg/geor-intres.html| accessdate=December 30 | accessyear=2006 ] (Curious fact:The match was between the two clubs FC Dinamo Tbilisi and Žalgiris Vilnius, but some time later, around 1992/93, officials football federations of these countries decided to change the status of the game to international. The decision was due to the fact that the clubs contained the best Georgian and Lithuanian players, so the countries designated the clubs their official teams). This was the Georgian team's only match prior to independence, which was declared on April 9, 1991. [cite web | title=CIA World Factbook - Georgia| work=CIA World Factbook | url=https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/print/gg.html| accessdate=December 30 | accessyear=2006 ]

The Georgian Football Federation became a member of both UEFA and FIFA in 1992 [cite web | title=Georgian Football Federation| work=UEFA | url=http://www.uefa.com/footballEurope/countries/country=GEO/Association=57157/index.html| accessdate=December 30 | accessyear=2006 ] , enabling Georgia to play competitive matches. The first of these came in September 1994, a 1-0 defeat to Moldova as part of the qualifiers for Euro 96. Georgia finished third in their group, ahead of Moldova and Wales, but seven points behind second-placed qualifiers Bulgaria. Georgia have subsequently finished bottom of their group in qualification for the 2000 and 2004 European Championships, and have finished third, fourth and sixth in World Cup qualifying groups. Consequently, Georgia has never qualified for the finals of a major tournament. However, recently they have shown relative success on the international scene by beating twice World Cup winners Uruguay and well established Turkey both in friendly matches.

World Cup record

*1930 to 1994 - "Did not enter, was part of USSR"
*1998 to 2006 - "Did not qualify"

European Championship record

*1960 to 1992 - "Did not enter, was part of USSR"
*1996 to 2008 - "Did not qualify"

Notable players

*Shota Arveladze
*Kakha Kaladze
*Georgi Kinkladze
*Temuri Ketsbaia
*Georgi Demetradze
*Alexander Iashvili

FIFA World Cup qualification

2010 FIFA World Cup qualification - UEFA Group 8
expanded = yes
fixtures = yes
tiebreakers =

Most capped Georgia players

As of March 27, 2008, the ten players with the most caps for Georgia are:

Top Georgia goalscorers

As of March 27, 2008, the seven players with the most goals for Georgia are:

Current squad

The following players were called up for the 2010 FIFA World Cup qualification against Italy on September 10 2008.

Recent call-ups

Footnotes

External links

* [http://www.gff.ge/index.php?lang_id=ENG&sec_id=114 Georgian Football Federation]
* [http://www.rsssf.com/tablesg/geor-intres.html RSSSF archive of results 1990-]