Thirteen years ago, the first American football club was formed in Georgia, a year after the country in the Caucasus region implemented constitutional reforms and held the nation’s first peaceful elections.
Early beginnings of Georgian football
Tbilisi Jvarosnebi (Crusaders) was the sole member of the American Football Federation of Georgia, which had been established in 2011, and a year later played an international club friendly for the first time in Turkey, against the Ankara Rednecks.
On Sunday, October 11, Georgia will take another significant step in the sport’s ongoing development when the men’s national tackle team hosts the Great Britain Development Squad at Level 2 of the 2027/27 IFAF Men’s European Championships. The Mukhianis Rugby Complex in Tbilisi will host the historic Georgia debut as they grace the competitive international scene in tackle football for the first time.
Georgia’s men’s flag football team competed at the IFAF European Continental Championships in 2023 and 2025 and in friendly games, and now its tackle football program is in the spotlight.
A historic first under MacKay
Scottish head coach Tom MacKay will lead Georgia’s momentous first foray into the relative unknown having been introduced to federation president David Palavandishvili by a mutual American friend. MacKay has been coaching for more than twice as long as the sport has been played in Georgia.
“I think we will have good team,” says Palavandishvili. “It’s our first match. We are not expecting that we will win this game, but we will try our best and we will try to show a good quality game.
“We want to show Great Britain our hospitality, not just the game, and our traditions and everything we have in Georgia.”
Domestic league lays the foundation
The step up to compete in an IFAF tournament comes in a year when Georgia’s six club teams began playing 11 on 11 tackle football having previously fielded teams playing 9 on 9 games. It is ten years since the first match between two Georgian clubs saw the Jvarosnebi and Grizzlies meet.
The addition of three new clubs in 2017 – the Rustavi Steelers, Kutaisi Lions, and Iberia – prompted the first Georgian National Championship, with pioneers Tbilisi Jvarosnebi crowned the inaugural champions. The Tbilisi Eagles – formed by Palavandishvili and named after his favorite NFL team – swelled the league’s numbers in 2018 along with the Sokhumi Warriors.
The next natural step was for Georgia to form a national team, which traveled to take on Kazakhstan in 2019 in an international friendly, losing narrowly. Seven years later, those humble beginnings are a distant past now that Georgia will both host and travel to Level 2 opponents Great Britain and Spain with two games this year and a pair in 2027.
Physicality a source of confidence
“It is a huge milestone for us,” adds Palavandishvili. “Very historic for Georgia to be playing. It’s incredible.
“Physicality will be our strength. We still need to learn a lot of technique, the playbook also. But at this moment our main power is the physicality because with our genetics, Georgian people are very strong. We have a lot of Olympic champions like the strongest guy in weightlifting, Lasha Talakhadze, who is a three-time Olympian champion. Also arm wrestlers and two of the greatest UFC champions come from Georgia, so that is how we are strong.”
European campaign and financial backing
After taking on the GB Development Squad on home soil on Sunday, Georgia will travel to face Spain on October 24 and next year when the tournament resumes will head to Great Britain for the return fixture and will welcome Spain to Tbilisi.
While Georgia faces the same financial challenges that all national teams must overcome for a full roster of players, coaches and equipment to traverse across Europe, the federation has generated sufficient funds to cover the cost of all players’ travel under Palavandishvili’s leadership. Local sponsors, American companies in Georgia and former New York Governor George Pitaki, who has championed American football in Eastern Europe, have all contributed to the cause.
Regardless of their results in this inaugural campaign, Georgia has arrived proudly on the world map of American football.