I eventually managed to get my hands on a programme for the recent Georgia-Scotland match – Well you’ve got to collect the rough with the smooth haven’t you? Anyway, it was good to see much of the programme was in English and it can be enlightening to see ourselves as others see us.
An interview with Zurab Khizanishvili, the former Dundee and Rangers defender now playing in Azerbaijan with Inter Baku, revealed that he thought the majority of Scotland’s travelling support would be Celtic fans. Hmmm….. He also thought Scotland had a much stronger team back in 2007 when we last visited Tbilisi.
A separate article on the 2007 game however ended joyfully with the mention of Scottish journalists calling home, hysterically reporting that their team had been beaten by a side full of schoolkids.
We were also reminded that our Georgian pain went back to the 1982 World Cup Finals when Dinamo Tbilisi’s Chivadze and Shengelia scored for the USSR in the 2-2 draw with Scotland in Malaga. Thanks for that…….
Meanwhile an 11 step introduction to Scottish Football included mention of The Wembley Wizards;Denis Law being the only Scot to win the European Footballer of the Year award; Argentina and Ally’s Tartan Army; the adoption of ‘Do-Ri-Me’ as one of our anthems; Berti McVogts; and Alex Ferguson’s European successes with Aberdeen.
The only Scotland player pen pics were of Shaun Maloney, Scott Brown and Steven Naismith although there was also an article entitled ‘Mr. Gemmill’ which took a brief look at the career highlights of Oor Archie. An added bonus however was photographs [and retro pen pics] of former Georgian internationalists Giorgi Nemsadze and Temur Ketsbaia resplendent in their Dundee F.C. strips. Well I liked it anyway…
Robert Marshall
First posted on Facebook September 20th, 2015
The Scotland Epistles Football Magazine 
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