Georgia 1 Croatia 0 – A Night to Remember

On Saturday I went to the Georgia versus Croatia Euro 2012 qualifying match. What a night it turned out to be!

Match background

Ranked a lowly 72nd in the FIFA world rankings, Georgia were massive underdogs going into the match against a very good Croatia side, currently sitting at a highly commendable 8th in the same rankings.

Interestingly, this was the first time the two countries had faced each other at senior international football. Further yet, and perhaps less surprisingly, teams representing the two nations have never met in UEFA club competition (I found these stats on the UEFA website).

As for their qualifying table (Group F), Croatia were sitting top of the table with three wins and a draw out of four (10 points). Greece occupied second place with two wins and two draws from their four games (8 points). Georgia, despite also remaining undefeated, only had the one win from their four games, with three draws (6 points). Without a doubt Georgia needed to take something from the Croatia game to have any realistic prospects of qualification, whether it be automatic or through the dreaded playoffs. Israel, Latvia and Malta made up the rest of the group, but with Latvia and Malta both having lost two games already are off the pace and it would take a miracle for them to occupy a qualification spot at the end of the campaign. Israel are still in the mix, and they play Georgia in Israel on Tuesday evening which could a vital match for both nations.

En Route to the Stadium

I went to the match with my host-brother and some of my good TLG friends. Me and my brother left our home in Gldani (a district of Tbilisi) and made our way for the metro. Unsurprisingly, the metro was very busy with excited fans also making their way to the game. The somewhat crammed metro ride didn’t take too long before we all piled off at the nearby stop. Outside the metro there was a huge gathering of fans, some of whom were no doubt waiting for friends coming from other parts of the metro.

The stadium is only a five minute walk from the metro and it’s no problem to get to. We waited near the metro for some of our (Georgian) friends to arrive. When they did, we walked to the ground. Initially, we could not see the stadium from the metro, but we could make out the nice glow of the floodlights which made it easier for us to navigate there. It’s a great feeling walking to the stadium alongside all of the other fans in anticipation for the night’s match. The local Georgians were in high spirit and sang plenty of songs en route. Many carried Georgia flags, had their faces painted and had various drums with them. Some had even filled empty plastic bottles with stones to make a sort of rattle, although I would have been highly surprised if they got into the stadium with that.

Arrival at the Stadium

We arrived at the stadium about fifteen minutes to kick off. Unlike most football stadiums in the UK there are no turnstiles. Instead, each access point to the stadium are blocked by about a dozen police officers, who are in charge of checking each fan’s ticket before letting them into the concourse. There was no queuing system so you had to push your way to the front if you wanted to avoid waiting. Once you made it past this blockade you were inside the stadium’s concourse. You could then walk around the perimeter of the stadium to find the stand your seats were allocated for. As it so happened, our tickets were for the East stand which was right next to the access point we had come in at.

We encountered our first problem of the evening and it was a considerable one at that. We walked up the stairs and approached the last police ticket-check we needed to pass through which would take us into the seating area and give us our eagerly-anticipated view of the inside of the stadium. Inexplicably, my brother had somehow managed to lose his ticket at some point between the first ticket-check outside the stadium to this final ticket-check before taking our seats. Consequently, the police refused to let him in without a ticket. How he managed to lose his ticket in about a two minute walk I will never know, but things like this do seem happen in life so it was best not to dwell on it. We told the friends we were with just to take their seats and we would have a stab in the dark of trying to find the ticket on the ground somewhere. As you can imagine, this was all in vain and it was nowhere to be found.

I could tell my brother was massively disappointed and most probably felt a combination of embarrassment and stupidity as well as other negative emotions. He said he would go home but I persuaded him to stay and told him to speak to some of the police officers; it was worth a shot. Thankfully, after a great deal of pleading, one of the police officers let us through and we got our first glimpse of inside the stadium.

Inside the Stadium

The game was already underway, and the whole stadium looked utterly mesmerising, particularly as it was full to capacity. The atmosphere was electric and the pitch was in great condition too, perfect for a night’s football. Unfortunately, we were actually a tier up from our friends. We didn’t really have any other alternative considering we were very lucky to be let into the tier without both our tickets in the first place. As the match was a sell-out, we had nowhere to sit. Instead, we stood in the stairwell bisecting two areas of seating. In fact, there were lots of other Georgians standing with us, either the organisers oversold tickets or the police officer who let us through let everyone else without tickets through too! In any event, it gave us a perfect view of the game, very similar to the TV view of football matches. From where we were we could see our friends sitting (where we should have been) at the front row of the bottom tier very close to one of the corner flags.

As I said in the previous paragraph, the atmosphere was electric. This could have been a World Cup Final for all I’d have known; the place was absolutely buzzing. There were several Mexican Waves, the first time I’ve seen that at any sporting event in years. There were also several chants throughout the match, some included “Saqartvelo!! Saqartvelo!!” (Georgia!! Georgia!!) and “gooalllliieee!!” (goooaaallll!!), which they chanted throughout the match whilst it was 0-0. The Georgians were very much in high spirits and it was interesting to watch their reactions as the match went on.

The Match

The match itself was very interesting to watch. In the first half, Georgia looked very slow and sluggish, and I felt Croatia were much crisper on the ball. Georgia couldn’t really create any real chances, and kept losing possession with stray passes and also failing to win any 50/50s. They opted for a fairly defensive 4-5-1 formation leaving eventual-goalscorer Kobiashvili stranded up top by himself. He chased everything, but as many Scottish football fans will know (i.e. anyone who has ever seen Kenny Miller playing the same role for his country), without decent support from the midfielders it’s very difficult to put the defense under any significant pressure. Having said this, Croatia could not create any meaningful chances themselves, despite having quality attacking players such as Luka Modrić, Niko Kranjčar, Nikola Kalinić, Mladen Petrić and Darijo Srna. They all looked very classy on the ball, particularly Modrić who always looked lively, but they could not create anything in the final third. It was no surprise then that the first half ended 0-0. I fully expected Bilic (the Croatia coach) to lambast his players at the break which would see the team perform much better in the second half, but this wasn’t the case.

On a side note, Kakha Kaladze, the Georgian captain, was as ever a rock at the back. The team won’t be the same when he eventually retires. He brings so much more aside from his defensive attributes. He’s a leader and has a great footballing psychology, similar to the presence Ryan Giggs has in the Manchester United team. Hopefully, Kaladze can lead his country to qualification. Already 33 years old, he has a few more years left in him, and so would be great to see him finally lead out his country at a major tournament. Time will tell…

Anyway, the second half started much the same as the first half ended. At times it was a bit sloppy with too much of the game being played in the middle of the park. Croatia still looked the better team, but still failed when it came to putting the ball into the back of the net. The game started to stretch around the 65-70 minute mark. Georgia suddenly became much more confident and created some decent chances, despite none of them registering as a shot on target. I genuinely felt this game would end in a stale-mate. I even said to my host-brother with about five minutes left on the clock, “This is definitely going to end 0-0”. I possibly said this in the vain hope something extraordinary would happen. And indeed this proved to be the case. In the dying stages of the game, substitute Martsvaladze remained onside to cut the ball back (in true Pro Evolution Soccer or FIFA fashion) for striker Levan Kobiashvili who coolly applied the finish to beat the Croatian keeper from ten yards.

The Celebration

The whole stadium went absolutely nuts. The feeling was euphoric. It all happened so fast, but I remember hugging my brother and some of the Georgians who were stood beside us. It didn’t really matter; we were all there supporting the Georgian team and we were all united. I can’t recall how long exactly we were jumping up and down for but it felt like forever. I had my camera in my hand as the goal went in and had to try my best, in between the jumping and the hugging and the cheering, not to drop it as it surely would have been a goner upon impact.

On one of the big screens in the stadium it read ‘goal’ in Georgian (I’m not sure on the actual Latin spelling of the word – but my guess is ‘goalie’…). It was also an amazing sight to see ‘Georgia 1, Croatia 0, 90 (minutes)’ on the other big screen. Somehow, somehow, Georgia had managed to pull off a massive upset and cemented their place as serious contenders for the qualifying spots in the table.

Despite this last minute goal, there were still a few minutes of injury time to be played. The celebrations were put on pause momentarily as Croatia suddenly started to push forward and put the Georgian defense under great pressure. They forced two corners right at the death – I was a little surprised that the Croatian keeper didn’t go up for the second one at least – and our hearts were in our mouths. Thankfully, the defense managed to clear the danger. A few seconds later, the referee blew his whistle to end the game; Georgia were victorious!

The celebrations resumed the second the referee had blown his whistle, a massive cheer around the stadium followed by hugs all round. The national anthem was then sung by every Georgian in the ground which was awesome. After this Queen’s ‘We are the Champions’ song echoed round the stadium as the fans started filtering their out of the stadium.

On the way back to the metro all the fans were singing, chanting and partying. There was a carnival atmosphere in the city. The metro was heaving and there were long queues, but no-one minded because of the fantastic result. Eventually, at around 1am, my brother and I arrived home. It was one of the best evenings I’ve had here in Georgia and I am very much looking forward to going to some of their other home qualifying games later this year.

Aftermath

Despite the victory of the group leaders, Georgia remained 3rd in the table because Greece also secured a last minute victory over Malta. The top three teams are separated by only two points, so it is all very much to play for. On Tuesday evening, Georgia play away to Israel, and if they win this game they will go top of the table. A win for Israel would take them back into contention, and it would mean the top four teams are separated by just two points. Qualification may not be out of the question just yet, but I can’t honestly see Georgia topping the group. Consistency is the key although I don’t think the squad is strong enough for this to be achieved. I am going to predict Croatia topping the group and *fingers crossed* Georgia coming in a close second.

Aftermath - UPDATE

I am writing this on Wednesday evening, two days after finishing the first edit of the blog.

Last night, Georgia suffered a massively disappointing 1-0 defeat to Israel, meaning Group F is wide open once again. Interestingly, this was Ketsbaia’s first defeat as Georgian coach since taking over in November 2009. They had been undefeated for ten games, which is almost as big an achievement as beating the Croats on Saturday evening was.

After their 1-0 victory, Israel have actually leapfrogged Georgia into 3rd position, with both teams having played a game more than Croatia and Greece who occupy the top two positions in the table. Georgia have it all to do now, especially since they still have to play the Croats away from home in June, but I believe they can still qualify. It is vital they beat Latvia and Malta in September as well as Greece in October. In fact, the game against Greece is at home and is also the last qualifying match. I will definitely be at that match, and it’ll be a fascinating evening if, for example, their qualification to the Euro 2012 finals rests in their hands. Of course, only time will tell, and I remain hopeful. One thing is for sure, it’d be an absolute miracle if both Georgia and Scotland qualified for the finals!