Khvicha Kvaratskhelia: How PSG’s Georgia winger became a Champions League winner

The Kvaratskhelia family home in Tbilisi, where he grew up, does not advertise that a world football star grew up there.

It’s one of those anonymous Soviet-era apartment blocks that populate many parts of the city: concrete, worn out, functional rather than pretty, surrounded by symmetrical neighbors and the everyday sounds of a working-class area.

Inside this building I met his father Badri – a former Dinamo Tbilisi player and Azerbaijan international – and his mother Maka, when their son was playing for Napoli.

It was a warm and welcoming home. Humble, not full of luxuries, but full of memories. Everywhere I looked there were little mementos of his trip – photographs, trophies, t-shirts. Among them is the first shirt he wore with Dinamo Tbilisi.

“Because this is where Khvicha’s professional career started. He should be a dynamo,” Macca said. “His path to the top started here.”

Kvaratskhelia still uses his small bedroom when he returns. In one corner there is a computer table, a keyboard, large headphones and the type of chair used by gamers.

This little world is where he disappears for hours when he returns home.

Born on February 12, 2001, from an early age, football was an integral part of his life. As his mother remembers, he would walk with the ball and sleep with it. Football was everything, which doesn’t mean it was an easy road.

A graduate of Dinamo Tbilisi’s academy, he made his professional debut as a 16-year-old in 2017 before moving to Rustavi and then on loan to Lokomotiv Moscow where he would earn his first big salary, money that allowed him to pay for his father’s life-saving heart surgery.

“It wasn’t even a question for him,” Badri said.

On 22 May 2019, the 18-year-old won his first major honor when Lokomotiv Moscow won the Russian Cup.

This was followed by a move to Rubin Kazan where he spent three seasons and twice won the Russian League Best Young Player award.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine led to his stay being ended, when FIFA announced on 7 March 2022 that all foreign players in Russia could unilaterally suspend their contracts until 30 June and sign with clubs outside Russia until the same date.

He returned home to sign with Georgian club Dinamo Batumi.