Davit Khocholava ( ka, დავით ხოჭოლავა, tr, ; born 8 February 1993) is a Georgian retired professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who played as a

centre-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...

Club career

Early years

Born in

Tbilisi Tbilisi ( ; ka, თბილისი, ), in some languages still known by its pre-1936 name Tiflis ( ), ( ka, ტფილისი, tr ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Georgia (country), largest city of Georgia ( ...

, Khocholava started his career in Saburtalo, where his first manager was Giorgi Devdariani. Later some of the members of his team, including

Valeri Kazaishvili Valeri "Vako" Qazaishvili (born 29 January 1993) is a Georgian professional association football, footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder for Chinese Super League club Shandong Taishan F.C., Shandong Taishan and the Georgia national footb ...

Giorgi Chanturia Giorgi Chanturia bust in The 9th April Garden in Georgia Giorgi Chanturia ( ka">გიორგი ჭანტურია, ; 19 August 1959 – 3 December 1994) was a Georgian politician and the National Democratic Party leader who was murde ...

and

Lasha Parunashvili Lasha Parunashvili ( ka, ლაშა პარუნაშვილი; born 14 February 1993) is a Georgian professional footballer who plays as a midfielder for Erovnuli Liga club Samtredia. International career Parunashvili made his debut f ...

, became Georgia internationals. Khocholava was a striker during his youth career. However, Devdariani later offered him to play in defense and Khocholava accepted. Davit Khocholava

Khocholava signed for

Dinamo Tbilisi Dinamo Tbilisi is a sports club from Tbilisi, Georgia (country), Georgia. It was founded in 1925. Among its highest honors, is the European trophy earned by its Association football, football team which won the Cup Winners' Cup in 1981, beating ...

in 2011. He found it difficult to become a member of the starting line-up, having a six-month loan spell at

Kolkheti Poti FC Kolkheti 1913, commonly referred to as Kolkheti Poti, is a Georgian football club based in Poti. The team competes in the Erovnuli Liga, the top division of Georgian football. Being registered in 1913, Kolkheti is considered one of the olde ...

in order to get some more playing time. In 2014, he decided to leave

-based club and moved to

Shukura Kobuleti FC Shukura Kobuleti, commonly known as Shukura Kobuleti or simply Shukura, is a Georgian football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports ...

. He was offered to the club after the recommendation of famous Georgian footballer

Revaz Chelebadze Revaz Chelebadze ( ka, რევაზ ჩელებაძე; born 2 October 1955) is a Georgian retired footballer who played as a striker. He was nicknamed Chele (an allusion to Pelé), for his brilliant technical play and ability to ...

, who played for Dinamo Tbilisi in

Soviet era The history of the Soviet Union (USSR) (1922–91) began with the ideals of the Russian Bolshevik Revolution and ended in dissolution amidst economic collapse and political disintegration. Established in 1922 following the Russian Civil War, ...

. He was the sporting director of the club. Khocholava spent the 2014–15 season with the club before signing for

Chornomorets Odesa FC Chornomorets Odesa ( ) is a Ukrainian professional football club based in Odesa, Ukraine. According to the club's website, it was formed in 1936 as ''Dynamo'', but until 2002 it carried a logo with 1958 and 1959 Ukrainian Premier League The Ukrainian Premier League ( ) or UPL is a professional association football league in Ukraine and the highest level of the Ukrainian football league system. Originally known as the Vyshcha Liha ( , ) it was formed in 1991 during the 1992 in ...

in March 2017.

Shakhtar Donetsk

In April 2017,

Shakhtar Donetsk Football Club Shakhtar Donetsk () is a Ukrainian professional Association football, football club that was based in the city of Donetsk until 2014 when, due to the War in Donbas (2014–2022), War in Donbas, the club was forced to move to Lvi ...

confirmed that Khocholava had signed a five-year deal with the club, joining them at the start of the following season.

Copenhagen

On 6 July 2021,

Danish Superliga The Danish Superliga (, ) is a professional association football league in Denmark and the highest level of the Danish football league system. The league is currently contested by 12 teams each year, with 2 teams relegated. It is the current ...

side

F.C. Copenhagen Football Club Copenhagen (, ), commonly known as F.C. København, F.C. Copenhagen, Copenhagen, or simply FCK, is a Danish professional football club based in Copenhagen. FCK was founded in 1992 as a superstructure on top of Kjøbenhavns Boldklub ...

announced they had signed Khocholava on a four-year deal. On 8 August he scored his first goal for the club in a 4–2 victory in the Copenhagen Derby against rivals

Brøndby IF Brøndbyernes Idrætsforening (, usually abbreviated to Brøndby IF (), is a Danish professional Football club (association football), football club based in Brøndbyvester. Brøndby IF denotes the professional football section of Brøndbyernes ...

. On 22 May 2022, with the club he won the

in the season 2021–22 and qualified for the

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

for the season

2022–23 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen ...

. On July 7, 2024, Khocholava announced his decision to retire from professional football.

International career

Khocholava was named in the Georgia national team's senior squad for a

2018 FIFA World Cup The 2018 FIFA World Cup was the 21st FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for national association football, football teams organized by FIFA. It took place in Russia from 14 June to 15 July 2018, after the country was awarded t ...

qualifier against

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

in September 2016. He made his debut for Georgia on 23 January 2017 in a friendly against

Uzbekistan , image_flag = Flag of Uzbekistan.svg , image_coat = Emblem of Uzbekistan.svg , symbol_type = Emblem of Uzbekistan, Emblem , national_anthem = "State Anthem of Uzbekistan, State Anthem of the Republ ...

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Olimpi Rustavi *

Georgian Super Cup The Georgian Super Cup is a super cup tournament in Georgian football. Founded in 1996 as a two-team competition, the current version has been contested since 2023 by four teams, those being the first, second, and third placed teams in the Erovnul ...

2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...

Dinamo Tbilisi * Georgian League:

2012–13 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

Georgian Cup The Georgian Cup ( ka, საქართველოს თასი) is the main annual association football knockout cup competition in Georgia. It is organized by the Georgian Football Federation (GFF) and is open to clubs of all divisions. Th ...

Shakhtar Donetsk *

Ukrainian Premier League The Ukrainian Premier League ( ) or UPL is a professional association football league in Ukraine and the highest level of the Ukrainian football league system. Originally known as the Vyshcha Liha ( , ) it was formed in 1991 during the 1992 in ...

: 2017–18, 2018–19, 2019–20 *

Ukrainian Cup The Ukrainian Cup ( ) is an association football national knockout cup competition run by the Ukrainian Association of Football. The competition is conducted almost exclusively among professional clubs. Since the 2003–04 season, the Cup winner qu ...

: 2017–18, 2018–19 *

Ukrainian Super Cup The Ukrainian Super Cup () is an association football game of the Ukrainian Premier League in traditional super cup format that acts as the grand-opening for every new football (soccer), football competition season in Ukraine. Originally it was s ...

2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...

Copenhagen *

: 2021–22

References

External links

Profile
at the F.C. Copenhagen website *
Davit Khocholava
at football.sport.ua * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Khocholava, Davit 1993 births Living people Footballers from Tbilisi Men's footballers from Georgia (country) 21st-century sportsmen from Georgia (country) Men's association football defenders FC Dinamo Tbilisi players FC Sioni Bolnisi players FC Metalurgi Rustavi players FC Kolkheti-1913 Poti players FC Shukura Kobuleti players FC Chornomorets Odesa players FC Shakhtar Donetsk players F.C. Copenhagen players Erovnuli Liga players Ukrainian Premier League players Danish Superliga players Georgia (country) men's international footballers Georgia (country) men's youth international footballers Georgia (country) men's under-21 international footballers Expatriate men's footballers from Georgia (country) Expatriate men's footballers in Denmark Expatriate men's footballers in Ukraine Expatriate sportspeople from Georgia (country) in Denmark Expatriate sportspeople from Georgia (country) in Ukraine