Georgian-Azerbaijani football. This time hooligans off field

On Tuesday, Georgia's football champion 'Samtredia' played the second match with Azerbaijan's Qarabag (Agdam) within the UEFA Champions League second qualifying round and lost again. This time with the score 0:1. They suffered devastating 5-0 defeat by the Aghdam team in the first match. FC Samtredia coach Gio Tseatsadze congratulated the rivals on the deserved victory and said that the success of the Azerbaijani team is explained "not only by significant investments in football, but also by the fact that they have brilliant football players." This concludes the sporting component of the event: the best men won, and there is room for a theoretical discussion only as to what caused such an obvious degradation of the once-famous in Europe and the USSR Georgian football school, which gave the world football community three or four stars.

But this time the political, and even interstate, background of an honest and noble sport duel, provocators of a nationalistic nature made repeated attempts to ruin which, was not less interesting. In particular, the events of July 4 and July 22, 2015, when irresponsible youngsters, or well disguised, specially trained near-football "saboteurs" caused such a stir in Georgian-Azerbaijani relations, that Prime Minister Georgi Kvirikashvili had to apologize in order not to increase the harm, caused to the traditionally friendly relations between the two neighboring countries.

Nevertheless, the mentioned "saboteurs" were not identified, and nothing is known about any sanctions against them. Georgian Football Federation was punished by the UEFA, although no athlete and no member of the federation provoked riots, especially nationalist invectives in the stands.

The Georgian authorities took the acquired experience into account and made thorough preparations: the match took place not in Samtredia, but in Tbilisi - at the main stadium of the country 'Dynamo-arena'. There are always more resources in the capital to exclude unwanted developments. And despite free entrance to the stadium (which is revealing in itself), there were many police officers. Moreover, the police backs were strengthened by their colleagues in civilian clothes. Otherwise, it is difficult to explain how and where the strong middle-aged people among the groups of young fans sitting in the stands, unfamiliar to them, came from.

The administration did everything to check the entrance to the stadium: they checked bags, took out bottles with water, they did not allowed to carry anything that even remotely resembles a poster (despite the innocuous content of the inscription), since such a poster could easily become a "provocative weapon" in case of a change in the inscription.

Despite the increased security measures, it had not been possible to fully eliminate incidents: Georgian and Azerbaijani media reported that before the match starts, a group of hooligans attacked Azerbaijani fans near the central stadium, stole their Azerbaijani flag and fled in disgrace, being scared by the police.

However, the official representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, speaking to Vestnik Kavkaza,  said that after thorough verification, these reports were not confirmed: "Our units completely controlled not just the stadium, but the entire perimeter. They accompanied all the buses with Azerbaijani fans from the hotel and back. That has not happened".

As for the flags, before the match, the Azerbaijani side demanded to stop attempts to bring any flags to the stadium except Georgian and Azerbaijani. There were no other flags indeed. According to Vestnik Kavkaza, on the eve of the match the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the State Security Service "held a conversation" with the leaders of the association of Georgian football fans 'Komagi'. They were reminded of responsibility not only for their own behavior at the stadium, but also for the behavior of members of the club who "broke into trust" for the purpose of provocation.

As a result, the match turned out to be "purely football", without dirty nationalist impurities at the stadium. Although the incident near the Dynamo-Arena (if it really happened) still overshadowed the overall impression. Nevertheless, Georgian authorities and fans are obliged to clarify everything and, in case of confirmation, again apologize for the irresponsible behavior of hooligans, nationalists and provocateurs. Only after this one can calmly talk about how the Georgian football "came to be here like this" in a purely sporting aspect.