Guria

Guria of Lanchkhuti had been playing since 1924, but the run that mattered came late: promotion out of the Soviet Second League in 1976, again in 1979, then second place in the Soviet First League in 1986 and once more in 1989 — a step from the top division of the whole union.

The ground tells that story better than the honours do. The Evgrapi Shevardnadze Stadium now holds 4,500, with 3,030 of those seated. In the late 1980s it took 22,000 — in a town that could not fill it from its own streets, so people came in from across Guria province for the football.

Guria won the Georgian Cup in 1990 and finished second in the Umaglesi Liga in both 1990 and 1991. Nothing since has come close: the club won Pirveli Liga in 2000–01 and again, in the western group, in 2012–13, which is the work of a side climbing back rather than defending anything.

Trips to Dinamo Zugdidi still carry more than the fixture warrants. The two towns sit on the same western side of the country, and the table goes out of the window in those games.

The yellow and blue have been in Lanchkhuti for a century, and in that time the highest the club has finished in a Georgian championship is second — twice, in consecutive seasons, both of them before 1992.