The place of warmth. That is the literal English translation of Tbilisi, a name inspired by the city’s thermal springs, but a chill descended on the Georgian capital this July as the European dreams of local giants Dinamo Tbilisi were snuffed out in brutal fashion. Champions Journal headed east to watch the Blue and Whites face Astana in the Champions League first qualifying round – and found a famous old club grappling with disappointment.
Having wrapped up a record 19th Georgian title last season, Dinamo and their supporters began the European preliminaries with hopes of snaring a Europa Conference League group stage berth at the very least. Those hopes were raised by exciting teenage prospect Gabriel Sigua earning a 1-1 first-leg draw in Kazakhstan, and they were positively soaring after 22 minutes at the Boris Paichadze Stadium the following week, when Ousmane Camara raced onto a through ball and placed a neat shot inside the far corner.
Dinamo were still leading Astana at the break, but as the sun set on their impressive arena, their Champions League star also went out. A pair of quick-fire goals shortly after the restart made sure of that, and the final whistle was met by men in blue shirts dropping to the pitch in disbelief. To make matters worse, Sigua was gone a week later, snapped up by Basel – and, a week after that, Dinamo’s European campaign was over altogether, halted by Maltese outfit Hamrun Spartans in the Conference League second qualifying round. For coach Giorgi Chiabrishvili too, this was the end of the road.
For the fans, meanwhile, this was not how the story was meant to go. Not after a year of fresh optimism across the local football scene, first revved up by Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s extraordinary debut season for Napoli. A melting pot of cultures at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, Georgia has often seemed like a forgotten outpost of the sport, but ‘Kvaradona’ put the nation back on the map as he helped the Partenopei win their first Italian title in 33 years. Born in Tbilisi and a Dinamo academy graduate, the 22-year-old winger ended the campaign with a wheelbarrow-load of personal accolades – including the Champions League Young Player of the Season award.
Then came the 2023 European Under-21 Championship. Along with Romania, Georgia co-hosted the tournament from June to July and duly seized the moment on and off the pitch. While the debutants surged through to the quarter-finals, only losing out to Israel on penalties, crowds flocked to see them in action. Indeed, the three highest match attendances in U21 EURO history were all set at Georgia games this summer, each of them topping 40,000 spectators at the Boris Paichadze Stadium.
Dinamo’s home ground is no stranger to landmark events, of course. Famed for its unobstructed views of the pitch, the 54,000-seater venue has served as a hub of local pride and Georgian identity since its opening in 1976. So too the arena it replaced on the same plot of land in the city’s left-bank district of Didube – Dinamo Stadium, the club’s headquarters for over four decades from 1935 onwards.
Styled as a classical amphitheatre, the original ground was an eye-catching sight, even in a city whose wide mix of architectural styles reflects its cultural diversity. It featured as a backdrop in the 1942 Georgian cinema epic Giorgi Saakadze, a historical drama which Joseph Stalin himself took an active role in modifying to his liking. Nevertheless, the stadium was renowned as a relatively safe harbour for locals to relax and have fun during an era of Soviet political repression, their match experience topped off by the release of pigeons whenever the home team scored.
Very often, it would be Boris Paichadze himself putting the ball in the net. Originally raised on the game in Poti – the port city where British sailors first brought football to Georgia – Paichadze spent his entire career with Dinamo, making his name as the Soviet Union’s first ‘wandering forward’ in an illustrious playing spell that spanned the 1930, 1940s and 1950s. Regarded as Georgia’s greatest talent of the 20th century, he later coached Dinamo and then served as a club official during the period when the stadium was built which would eventually bear his name.
The new venue, later renovated and turned all-seater in 2006, was constructed to meet the needs of a team on the rise. Dinamo had won the Soviet Top League for the first time in 1964 and were making waves with a dynamic, free-flowing style that stood in counterpoint to the more rigid systems of their Russian rivals. “Dinamo’s technique, skill and playing intellect enable us to name them the best eastern representatives of South American football traditions,” wrote France Football magazine in the 1960s, and those same expressive qualities continued to shine during their golden era.
Dinamo truly announced themselves to the world with a stunning 3-0 home defeat of Liverpool in the first round of the 1979/80 European Cup, a game watched by more than 80,000 spectators. Then, a season later, their greatest achievement of all, Dinamo seeing off the likes of West Ham and Feyenoord before downing Carl Zeiss Jena 2-1 in the 1981 Cup Winners’ Cup final, swashbuckling forward Ramaz Shengelia setting up Vladimir Gutsaev to equalise before legendary midfielder Vitaly Daraselia buried the winner.
That historic triumph is credited with having bolstered feelings of Georgian national pride and fed the growing clamour for independence, finally achieved in 1991. And that same pride was on full display again during the recent U21 EURO, players and fans alike belting out the anthem in unison. For Dinamo, however, the glory days currently feel a long way off. This summer’s swift exit from European contention was far from a blip, the club having last reached a continental group stage in the 2004/05 UEFA Cup.
Former academy chief Andrés Carrasco is the new man at the helm, and he faces an uphill task as daunting as the Caucasus mountains as he aims to revive their fortunes. But, as they attempt to catch the recent wave of optimism, Dinamo can at least look close to home for inspiration: to their own glorious history, and to the bronze statue of Paichadze outside the stadium, the great man standing guard at the entrance to one of eastern Europe’s largest and most spectacular arenas. The place where Dinamo once scaled remarkable heights – and where a nation found and continues to find its voice.
The place of warmth. That is the literal English translation of Tbilisi, a name inspired by the city’s thermal springs, but a chill descended on the Georgian capital this July as the European dreams of local giants Dinamo Tbilisi were snuffed out in brutal fashion. Champions Journal headed east to watch the Blue and Whites face Astana in the Champions League first qualifying round – and found a famous old club grappling with disappointment.
Having wrapped up a record 19th Georgian title last season, Dinamo and their supporters began the European preliminaries with hopes of snaring a Europa Conference League group stage berth at the very least. Those hopes were raised by exciting teenage prospect Gabriel Sigua earning a 1-1 first-leg draw in Kazakhstan, and they were positively soaring after 22 minutes at the Boris Paichadze Stadium the following week, when Ousmane Camara raced onto a through ball and placed a neat shot inside the far corner.
Dinamo were still leading Astana at the break, but as the sun set on their impressive arena, their Champions League star also went out. A pair of quick-fire goals shortly after the restart made sure of that, and the final whistle was met by men in blue shirts dropping to the pitch in disbelief. To make matters worse, Sigua was gone a week later, snapped up by Basel – and, a week after that, Dinamo’s European campaign was over altogether, halted by Maltese outfit Hamrun Spartans in the Conference League second qualifying round. For coach Giorgi Chiabrishvili too, this was the end of the road.
For the fans, meanwhile, this was not how the story was meant to go. Not after a year of fresh optimism across the local football scene, first revved up by Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s extraordinary debut season for Napoli. A melting pot of cultures at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, Georgia has often seemed like a forgotten outpost of the sport, but ‘Kvaradona’ put the nation back on the map as he helped the Partenopei win their first Italian title in 33 years. Born in Tbilisi and a Dinamo academy graduate, the 22-year-old winger ended the campaign with a wheelbarrow-load of personal accolades – including the Champions League Young Player of the Season award.
Then came the 2023 European Under-21 Championship. Along with Romania, Georgia co-hosted the tournament from June to July and duly seized the moment on and off the pitch. While the debutants surged through to the quarter-finals, only losing out to Israel on penalties, crowds flocked to see them in action. Indeed, the three highest match attendances in U21 EURO history were all set at Georgia games this summer, each of them topping 40,000 spectators at the Boris Paichadze Stadium.
Dinamo’s home ground is no stranger to landmark events, of course. Famed for its unobstructed views of the pitch, the 54,000-seater venue has served as a hub of local pride and Georgian identity since its opening in 1976. So too the arena it replaced on the same plot of land in the city’s left-bank district of Didube – Dinamo Stadium, the club’s headquarters for over four decades from 1935 onwards.
Styled as a classical amphitheatre, the original ground was an eye-catching sight, even in a city whose wide mix of architectural styles reflects its cultural diversity. It featured as a backdrop in the 1942 Georgian cinema epic Giorgi Saakadze, a historical drama which Joseph Stalin himself took an active role in modifying to his liking. Nevertheless, the stadium was renowned as a relatively safe harbour for locals to relax and have fun during an era of Soviet political repression, their match experience topped off by the release of pigeons whenever the home team scored.
Very often, it would be Boris Paichadze himself putting the ball in the net. Originally raised on the game in Poti – the port city where British sailors first brought football to Georgia – Paichadze spent his entire career with Dinamo, making his name as the Soviet Union’s first ‘wandering forward’ in an illustrious playing spell that spanned the 1930, 1940s and 1950s. Regarded as Georgia’s greatest talent of the 20th century, he later coached Dinamo and then served as a club official during the period when the stadium was built which would eventually bear his name.
The new venue, later renovated and turned all-seater in 2006, was constructed to meet the needs of a team on the rise. Dinamo had won the Soviet Top League for the first time in 1964 and were making waves with a dynamic, free-flowing style that stood in counterpoint to the more rigid systems of their Russian rivals. “Dinamo’s technique, skill and playing intellect enable us to name them the best eastern representatives of South American football traditions,” wrote France Football magazine in the 1960s, and those same expressive qualities continued to shine during their golden era.
Dinamo truly announced themselves to the world with a stunning 3-0 home defeat of Liverpool in the first round of the 1979/80 European Cup, a game watched by more than 80,000 spectators. Then, a season later, their greatest achievement of all, Dinamo seeing off the likes of West Ham and Feyenoord before downing Carl Zeiss Jena 2-1 in the 1981 Cup Winners’ Cup final, swashbuckling forward Ramaz Shengelia setting up Vladimir Gutsaev to equalise before legendary midfielder Vitaly Daraselia buried the winner.
That historic triumph is credited with having bolstered feelings of Georgian national pride and fed the growing clamour for independence, finally achieved in 1991. And that same pride was on full display again during the recent U21 EURO, players and fans alike belting out the anthem in unison. For Dinamo, however, the glory days currently feel a long way off. This summer’s swift exit from European contention was far from a blip, the club having last reached a continental group stage in the 2004/05 UEFA Cup.
Former academy chief Andrés Carrasco is the new man at the helm, and he faces an uphill task as daunting as the Caucasus mountains as he aims to revive their fortunes. But, as they attempt to catch the recent wave of optimism, Dinamo can at least look close to home for inspiration: to their own glorious history, and to the bronze statue of Paichadze outside the stadium, the great man standing guard at the entrance to one of eastern Europe’s largest and most spectacular arenas. The place where Dinamo once scaled remarkable heights – and where a nation found and continues to find its voice.
The place of warmth. That is the literal English translation of Tbilisi, a name inspired by the city’s thermal springs, but a chill descended on the Georgian capital this July as the European dreams of local giants Dinamo Tbilisi were snuffed out in brutal fashion. Champions Journal headed east to watch the Blue and Whites face Astana in the Champions League first qualifying round – and found a famous old club grappling with disappointment.
Having wrapped up a record 19th Georgian title last season, Dinamo and their supporters began the European preliminaries with hopes of snaring a Europa Conference League group stage berth at the very least. Those hopes were raised by exciting teenage prospect Gabriel Sigua earning a 1-1 first-leg draw in Kazakhstan, and they were positively soaring after 22 minutes at the Boris Paichadze Stadium the following week, when Ousmane Camara raced onto a through ball and placed a neat shot inside the far corner.
Dinamo were still leading Astana at the break, but as the sun set on their impressive arena, their Champions League star also went out. A pair of quick-fire goals shortly after the restart made sure of that, and the final whistle was met by men in blue shirts dropping to the pitch in disbelief. To make matters worse, Sigua was gone a week later, snapped up by Basel – and, a week after that, Dinamo’s European campaign was over altogether, halted by Maltese outfit Hamrun Spartans in the Conference League second qualifying round. For coach Giorgi Chiabrishvili too, this was the end of the road.
For the fans, meanwhile, this was not how the story was meant to go. Not after a year of fresh optimism across the local football scene, first revved up by Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s extraordinary debut season for Napoli. A melting pot of cultures at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, Georgia has often seemed like a forgotten outpost of the sport, but ‘Kvaradona’ put the nation back on the map as he helped the Partenopei win their first Italian title in 33 years. Born in Tbilisi and a Dinamo academy graduate, the 22-year-old winger ended the campaign with a wheelbarrow-load of personal accolades – including the Champions League Young Player of the Season award.
Then came the 2023 European Under-21 Championship. Along with Romania, Georgia co-hosted the tournament from June to July and duly seized the moment on and off the pitch. While the debutants surged through to the quarter-finals, only losing out to Israel on penalties, crowds flocked to see them in action. Indeed, the three highest match attendances in U21 EURO history were all set at Georgia games this summer, each of them topping 40,000 spectators at the Boris Paichadze Stadium.
Dinamo’s home ground is no stranger to landmark events, of course. Famed for its unobstructed views of the pitch, the 54,000-seater venue has served as a hub of local pride and Georgian identity since its opening in 1976. So too the arena it replaced on the same plot of land in the city’s left-bank district of Didube – Dinamo Stadium, the club’s headquarters for over four decades from 1935 onwards.
Styled as a classical amphitheatre, the original ground was an eye-catching sight, even in a city whose wide mix of architectural styles reflects its cultural diversity. It featured as a backdrop in the 1942 Georgian cinema epic Giorgi Saakadze, a historical drama which Joseph Stalin himself took an active role in modifying to his liking. Nevertheless, the stadium was renowned as a relatively safe harbour for locals to relax and have fun during an era of Soviet political repression, their match experience topped off by the release of pigeons whenever the home team scored.
Very often, it would be Boris Paichadze himself putting the ball in the net. Originally raised on the game in Poti – the port city where British sailors first brought football to Georgia – Paichadze spent his entire career with Dinamo, making his name as the Soviet Union’s first ‘wandering forward’ in an illustrious playing spell that spanned the 1930, 1940s and 1950s. Regarded as Georgia’s greatest talent of the 20th century, he later coached Dinamo and then served as a club official during the period when the stadium was built which would eventually bear his name.
The new venue, later renovated and turned all-seater in 2006, was constructed to meet the needs of a team on the rise. Dinamo had won the Soviet Top League for the first time in 1964 and were making waves with a dynamic, free-flowing style that stood in counterpoint to the more rigid systems of their Russian rivals. “Dinamo’s technique, skill and playing intellect enable us to name them the best eastern representatives of South American football traditions,” wrote France Football magazine in the 1960s, and those same expressive qualities continued to shine during their golden era.
Dinamo truly announced themselves to the world with a stunning 3-0 home defeat of Liverpool in the first round of the 1979/80 European Cup, a game watched by more than 80,000 spectators. Then, a season later, their greatest achievement of all, Dinamo seeing off the likes of West Ham and Feyenoord before downing Carl Zeiss Jena 2-1 in the 1981 Cup Winners’ Cup final, swashbuckling forward Ramaz Shengelia setting up Vladimir Gutsaev to equalise before legendary midfielder Vitaly Daraselia buried the winner.
That historic triumph is credited with having bolstered feelings of Georgian national pride and fed the growing clamour for independence, finally achieved in 1991. And that same pride was on full display again during the recent U21 EURO, players and fans alike belting out the anthem in unison. For Dinamo, however, the glory days currently feel a long way off. This summer’s swift exit from European contention was far from a blip, the club having last reached a continental group stage in the 2004/05 UEFA Cup.
Former academy chief Andrés Carrasco is the new man at the helm, and he faces an uphill task as daunting as the Caucasus mountains as he aims to revive their fortunes. But, as they attempt to catch the recent wave of optimism, Dinamo can at least look close to home for inspiration: to their own glorious history, and to the bronze statue of Paichadze outside the stadium, the great man standing guard at the entrance to one of eastern Europe’s largest and most spectacular arenas. The place where Dinamo once scaled remarkable heights – and where a nation found and continues to find its voice.
