Silence falls around the Avchala Stadium as England under-20s flanker Tristan Woodman carries into contact. A single bellowing scream of encouragement echoes through the ground as Woodman is collected by Georgia’s Ghaniasvili and Lomidze and held gratefully in their grasp. Everyone holds their breathe as referee Nika Amashukeli holds out his arm towards the Georgians with a simultaneous blow of his whistle, signalling a cacophony of noise. Bodies fall to the ground from both sides, sprawled in despair and elation, others mindlessly sprinting in circles in a moment of pure, unfiltered joy. Up in his box, Head Coach Lado Kilasonia wearily raises a clenched fist, his face wrought with disbelief.
Georgia under-20s had beaten England under-20s, the nation who had won the Junior World Championships on three occasions, five-time-finalists, had fallen to the nation who had never qualified until 2016, never finishing higher than ninth position. To call this a David v Goliath contest would be unfair to the brave Georgians, colossus’ in their own right and deserved victors. On this day a proud and decorated rugby nation with an unrivalled legacy of talent and success had succumb to unwavering passion and resilience.
No one had or could have predicted this result, a testament to the development and growth of a juniors set-up and more so, rugby nation, who have transitioned sensationally from a tier 2 minnow to a bonified international rugby powerhouse.
While they used to struggle for elite competition, Georgia under-18s defeated France in 2018 and are reigning under-18s Rugby Europe Champions while the under-20s boast victories over Scotland, Argentina, Ireland, Italy and now England, all in the past seven years. A steep shift in quality which can be seen in the senior team, who have achieved stunning victories over Italy and Wales.
How have Georgia achieved this remarkable transition? In a word: cohesion.
A backroom reshuffle in 2015 saw Lado Kilasonia become the under-20s Head Coach as well as an assistant to the senior national team and, later, The Black Lions, the Georgia Rugby-owned franchise and back-to-back reigning Rugby Europe Super Cup champions. While the senior team Head Coach and former under-20s coach, Levan Maisashvili, is also The Black Lions Head Coach and under-20s assistant, Zurab Amonashvili, leads the under-18s.
This creates an environment which is conducive to communication, mutual understanding and shared goals.
The Black Lions, in particular, are a key facet, allowing a large majority of Georgia’s coaching team, senior national players and junior players, to come together and train and play for a few months of the year, before returning to their respective clubs.
Questioned on what makes their junior set-up so successful, Lado Kilasonia emphasises the importance of this co-operation between coaches: “We share a lot information and experience and we know what we want to achieve.
“Through conversations together we decided that if we want to compete at the elite level we had to drill down and prepare players from an early age, to develop skills and understanding.
“We established an elite academy and many of those players have graduated to the senior team (the likes of Davit Niniashvili and Beka Saghinadze).
“This is important because we have very few players in Georgia, the population is only 3.5million and that is why we have to monitor players as often as possible and from a very young age.”
The other reason for this need for familiarity is the recent dispersion of Georgia’s talent. While a few years ago the whole under-20s squad would be Georgia-based domestic players, now at least half play in France for Top 14 or Pro D2 academies, a positive in the grand scheme of their development, of course, but a struggle for the national coaches.
“We try to get them to Georgia as much as possible, training together and when they go to their clubs we will communicate with the clubs to monitor their progress and set targets. Right now everyone is settled, the squad is picked (for the Junior World Championships) and the players know their goals.”
To the neutral, Georgia’s victory over England was a huge upset. When asked if he believed that his team would win the match, Lado replied calmly: “We’ve only had three games this year. France and England twice. We had three missions for these games, firstly, to see where the players are and to see which players we prefer in each position. Secondly, to establish our philosophy, our beliefs and how we want to play and lastly to adapt to the tempo.
“After the game against France and the first game against England we knew that we could compete and we knew that if we got every detail right, then we could win.
“Everything came together that day and it was a great day for Georgia Rugby. I have to say I am hugely thankful to France Rugby and England Rugby for giving us the opportunity to compete and develop, we are very lucky to play teams like France and England and it was a great experience for all of us.
When asked where they aim to finish in the fast-approaching Junior World Championships, beginning June 24th, Lado gave a similarly humble and calculated response: “We will aim to improve with every game and to stick to our philosophy of how we want to play.
“I don’t like to speak to about the future, I like to speak when the job is done.
“This is why we are very excited about competing at the Junior World Championships, it is the first step for a player on their way to playing senior international rugby and when we find out how they compare to the talent in other nations.
“Player will make mistakes and we will give them ‘work-ons’ and the players who succeed in the future will be those who go away and work hard to improve in these areas.”
Finally, Lado was invited to comment on whether Georgia should be invited into the exclusive Six Nations circle, where they can regularly compete with the world’s best teams.
He said: “Georgia deserve more games against the best opposition, from under-18s to senior level.
“We have so much to offer at the top level, our physicality our scrum, yes we have a lot to work on and we will learn but we deserve the chance.”
The Match Report 
Learnt a lot from this, all news to me! 👍☺️
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