Levan Mchedlidze ( ka, ლევან მჭედლიძე, tr, ; born 24 March 1990) is a retired Georgian 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 last played as a

forward Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward. Forward may also refer to: People *Forward (surname) Sports * Forward (association football) * Forward (basketball), including: ** Point forward ** Power forward (basketball) ** Smal ...

for Georgian club

Torpedo Kutaisi FC Torpedo Kutaisi ( Georgian: საფეხბურთო კლუბი ტორპედო ქუთაისი) is a Georgian professional football club based in Kutaisi, Georgia's third largest city. The team competes in the Erovnuli ...

Club career

Empoli

Originally noted in early 2006 by

Empoli Empoli () is a town and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Florence, Tuscany, Italy, about southwest of Florence, to the south of the Arno River, Arno in a plain formed by the river. The plain has been usable for agriculture since Ancient Ro ...

scout Gianni Carnevali, he joined the Tuscan side in September 2006, following his impressive performances with the Georgia under-19 national team in a youth competition in

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

, and despite some interest from

FC Bayern Munich Fußball-Club Bayern München e. V. (FCB, ), commonly known as Bayern Munich (), FC Bayern () or simply Bayern, is a German professional sports club based in Munich, Bavaria. They are most known for their men's professional association foo ...

. He was officially signed only one year later, in July 2007, due to bureaucratic issues concerning his non-

EU citizen The European Union citizenship is a legal status afforded to all nationals of member states of the European Union (EU). It was formally created with the adoption of the 1992 Maastricht Treaty, at the same time as the creation of the EU. EU ci ...

status.

Loan to Palermo

Following Empoli's relegation into

Serie B The Serie B (), officially known as Serie BKT for sponsorship reasons, is the second-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie A. It has been operating for over ninety years since the 1929–30 season. It had b ...

, Mchedlidze's future was put under discussion. On 30 August 2008,

Serie A The Serie A (), officially known as Serie A Enilive in Italy and Serie A Made in Italy abroad for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Italy and the highest tier of the Italian football league system. Establish ...

club

Palermo Palermo ( ; ; , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The ...

announced on their website to have signed Mchedlidze on a year-long loan, with the option to make the deal permanent at the end of the season. Later, Palermo chairman

Maurizio Zamparini Maurizio Zamparini (9 June 1941 – 1 February 2022) was an Italian businessman. He was the owner and director of football club Palermo between July 2002 – February 2017 and from July 2017 – December 2018. Biography Zamparini had business ...

announced to have paid €6.2 mln for the signing of the young Georgian striker. The club also confirmed the bid to be an actual permanent move, as a technical year-long loan that will be made permanent at the end of the 2008–09 season. Mchedlidze made his

debut on 24 September 2008, playing fifteen minutes in a league game against

Napoli Naples ( ; ; ) is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 908,082 within the city's administrative limits as of 2025, while its province-level municipality is the thir ...

, then scoring his first professional goal only a few weeks later, in what ultimately proved to be the winning goal in a surprising 2–1 away win against

Juventus Juventus Football Club (; from , ), commonly known as Juventus or colloquially as Juve (), is an Italian professional Association football, football List of football clubs in Italy, club based in Turin, Piedmont, who compete in Serie A, the ...

. Despite the high hopes for the young striker, he went on to make just another seven appearances that season and didn't add to his goal tally. Palermo agreed a one-year extension to his loan with Empoli in June 2009. In December 2009, after a lacklustre start of season, Mchedlidze did not return to Sicily from holidays in Georgia, citing lack of first team chances as the main reason behind his choice. The player was successively excluded from the first team and Palermo director of football Walter Sabatini successively confirmed the club will not arrange a deal for him. As of March 2010, the player has not returned to Sicily and his loan to Palermo was subsequently cancelled due to breach of contract.

Return to Empoli

In the

2010–11 Serie B The 2010–11 Serie B (known as the Serie bwin for sponsorship reasons) is the seventy-ninth season since its establishment in 1929, and the first one under the rule of the new Lega Serie B. A total of 22 teams contest the league, 15 of which retu ...

season, Mchedlidze made 21 appearances as his side finished mid-table, scoring 2 goals and managing 4 assists. Mchedlidze played a bit-part role for the majority of the 2011–12, 2012–13 and 2013–14 seasons, with most of his appearances coming off the bench. In the

2014–15 Serie A The 2014–15 Serie A (known as the Serie A TIM for sponsorship reasons) was the 113th season of top-tier Italian football, the 83rd in a round-robin tournament, and the fifth since its organization under a league committee separate from Serie ...

season, Mchedlidze scored 4 goals in the league, including a brace against Internazionale Milano on the final matchday. He was released by Empoli at the end of the

2018–19 Serie A The 2018–19 Serie A (known as the Serie A TIM for sponsorship reasons) was the 117th season of top-tier Italian football, the 87th in a round-robin tournament, and the 9th since its organization under a league committee separate from Serie B. ...

season, after thirteen years as a player for the Tuscan side.

Return to Georgia

In September, 2019, Mchedlidze agreed one-plus-one deal with

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 March 2021, Mchedlidze signed with

Dinamo Batumi FC Dinamo Batumi ( ka, საფეხბურთო კლუბი დინამო ბათუმი) is a Georgian professional football club based in Batumi, Adjara that competes in the Erovnuli Liga, the top division of the national f ...

International career

Despite having never played in his team also because of a knee injury during pre-season training, he was capped for the

Georgia national football team The Georgia national football team ( ka, საქართველოს ეროვნული საფეხბურთო ნაკრები, tr) represents Georgia (country), Georgia in men's international association football, foo ...

at the age of 17, for the

Euro 2008 qualifying Qualifying for the UEFA Euro 2008 finals tournament took place between August 2006 and November 2007. Fifty teams were divided into seven groups. In a Round-robin tournament, double round-robin system, each team played against each of the others ...

match against

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

. In spite of his young age, the coach

Klaus Toppmöller Klaus Toppmöller (born 12 August 1951) is a German football manager and former professional player. Playing career A forward, Toppmöller scored 108 Bundesliga goals for 1. FC Kaiserslautern in 204 matches in the West German top flight. He ear ...

made him play against the World Champions. In the following match, Mchedlidze, being featured together with two other teenage team-mates (

Levan Kenia Levan Kenia ( ka, ლევან ყენია; born 18 October 1990) is a Georgian professional football manager and former player who most recently was the head coach of Oberliga club KFC Uerdingen. Club career Kenia joined Schalke 04 fr ...

and Giorgi Makaridze in the starting lineup), scored the first goal in the 2–0 victory against

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

, thus marking the first goal of his professional career.

Career statistics

Club

Honours

Club

Torpedo Kutaisi *

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 ...

2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...

Dinamo Tbilisi: *

Erovnuli Liga The Erovnuli Liga ( ka, ეროვნული ლიგა; ) is the top Division (sport), division of professional top tier Association football, football in Georgia (Country), Georgia. Since 1990, it has been organized by the Professional ...

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Mchedlidze, Levan 1990 births Living people FC Dila Gori players FC Dinamo Tbilisi players Erovnuli Liga players Palermo FC players Empoli FC players Serie A players Serie B players Men's association football forwards Men's footballers from Georgia (country) Georgia (country) men's international footballers Georgia (country) men's under-21 international footballers 21st-century sportsmen from Georgia (country) Expatriate men's footballers from Georgia (country) Expatriate men's footballers in Italy Footballers from Tbilisi