Georgia 1-0 Turkey Tbilisi, 07/02/07

A single goal after 75 minutes from David Siradze was enough to defeat Turkey and retain the UFWC title for Georgia. Siradze, who plays his club football in the German second division, was left unmarked to head home from a corner kick. It was a deserved victory for Georgia, who were on top for much of the game, watched by a near-capacity 50,000 crowd, despite missing key players Kaladze, Arveladze, and Kobiashvili.

All claims that this match between Black Sea neighbours was a ‘friendly’ were blown away by a major first-half brawl between the two sets of players – although none were sent off. Turkey have fighting form – they were involved in a notorious scuffle with Switzerland in 2005. Georgia now have 2 ranking points, while Turkey are still yet to win a UFWC match. Georgia were 5 to 1 outsiders to win this match with some bookmakers, so clued-up UFWC fans could have made a healthy profit.

Watch Siradze’s winning header via YouTube.

The next UFWC title match will see Georgia travel to Hampden Park to take on all-time UFWC champions Scotland on 24 March 2007. A full preview will appear here soon. Should Scotland win that match and take the unofficial title, their next match – just four days later – is against official champions Italy. Exciting times ahead for UFWC fans…

Georgia: Nukri Revishvili (Georgi Lomaia, 46), Georgy Shashiashvili, Zaal Eliava, Lasha Salukvadze, Zurab Khizanishvili, Zurab Menteshashvili, Levan Tskitishvili, David Kverkvelia, (Gogita Gogua, 67), Georgi Demitradze (Georgi Benashvili, 87), David Siradze (David Mudzhiri, 77), Lado Burduli (Mikhail Ashvetia, 81).

Turkey: Volkan Demirel, Tugay Kerimoglu (Gokhan Unal, 79), Arda Turan (Metin Tumer, 63), Servet Cetin, Hamit Altintop, Mehmet Aurelio, Aydin Toscali, Tuncay Sanli (Fatih Tekke, 46), Ibrahim Uzulmez, Sabri Sarioglu (Mehmet Topuz, 63), Halil Altintop (Gokdeniz Karadeniz, 46).

Match Reports Georgia, Turkey

Georgia vs Turkey Tbilisi, 07/02/07

Although Georgia and Turkey are geographical neighbours, in a football sense they seem miles apart. FIFA rank UFWC title holders Georgia 95th in the world, and Turkey 27th. But Turkey have never won a UFWC match, and Georgia comfortably beat Uruguay last time around. This is a title match that could easily go either way. The Georgian team, the ‘Jvarosnebi’ (Crusaders), are coached by German Klaus Toppmöller, and skippered by AC Milan stopper Kakha Kaladze. They will hope to welcome back all-time top scorer Shota Arveladze, formerly of Rangers and now at AZ Alkmaar, who missed the Uruguay match through injury. Schalke 04 midfielder Levan Kobiashvili was a two-goal hero in the match against Uruguay. Premiership interest comes courtesy of Blackburn Rovers defender Zurab Khizanishvili.

Turkey’s last match was a 1-1 away draw with official world champions Italy back in November, but it’s doubtful that many pointers can be taken from a friendly in which a total of 17 substitutions were made. Newcastle midfielder Emre Belozoglu could miss out against Georgia, being controversially absent from his club side in recent weeks (officially through injury) having been accused of making racist remarks during a Premiership match against Everton – he denies the claim. Turkey’s nickname is Ay-Yildizlar (the Crescent-Stars). The so-called ‘friendly’ will be played at the 59,000-capacity Boris Paichadze National Stadium of Georgia. The result and a full report will be posted here after the match.

Match Previews Georgia, Turkey