Saba Andreyevich Sazonov (; ka, საბა საზონოვი; born 1 February 2002) is a 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 plays 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 ...

for Italian club

Torino Turin ( , ; ; , then ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. The city is main ...

. Born in Russia, he plays for the Georgia national team internationally.

Early life

His mother Nino Nishnianidze is a former professional Georgian volleyball player from

Samtredia Samtredia ( ka, სამტრედია ) is a town in Imereti, Georgia (country), Georgia, lying in a lowland between the rivers Rioni River, Rioni and Tskhenis-Tsqali, west of the capital Tbilisi, and west of Georgia's third largest city K ...

. She moved to

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

where she met her Russian husband. During his childhood, Sazonov moved to Georgia and then back to Russia, to feel more comfortable with both countries' language and culture.

Club career

Sazonov made his debut in the

Russian Premier League The Russian Premier League (RPL; , ''Rossiyskaya premyer-liga''; РПЛ), also written as Russian Premier Liga, is a professional association football league in Russia and the highest level of the Russian football league system. It was establis ...

for

FC Zenit Saint Petersburg Football Club Zenit (, ), also known as Zenit Saint Petersburg or simply Zenit, is a Russian professional association football, football club based in Saint Petersburg. Founded in 1925 (or in 1914, according to some Russian sources), the club p ...

on 16 May 2021 in a game against

FC Tambov FC Tambov () was a Russian football team from Tambov. It last played in the Russian Premier League, having won promotion to the top division of Russian football in 2019, before dissolving in 2021. History FC Tambov started out on the professional ...

. He was substituted on for

Magomed Ozdoyev Magomed Mustafayevich Ozdoyev (; born 5 November 1992) is a Russian professional footballer who plays as a central midfielder for Greek Super League club PAOK and the Russia national football team. Personal life Magomed Ozdoyev was born in Groz ...

in the 76th minute. In June 2021, he joined

Dynamo Moscow MGO VFSO "Dynamo" (), commonly known as Dynamo Moscow (), is a Russian sports club based in Moscow. Founded by Felix Dzerzhinsky on 18 April 1923, Dynamo Moscow was the first institution created from the All-Union Dynamo Sports Club. Dynamo Mosco ...

on trial. On 9 July 2021, after impressing on trial, he signed a three-year contract with Dynamo. On 31 August 2023, he signed for

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

, becoming the third Georgian in the Serie A ahead the 2023–24 season. Having taken part in 13 league matches for Torino, Sazonov signed a year-long loan contract with

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 ...

on 30 August 2024. Before he played any games for Empoli, he suffered an

ACL tear ACL may refer to: Aviation * IATA airport code for Aguaclara Airport in Casanare Department, Colombia Companies and organizations * ACL Cables, a cable manufacturing company in Sri Lanka * Administration for Community Living, United States, f ...

in training, which eventually kept him out of play for the rest on the 2024–25 season.

International career

In September 2022, Sazonov was called up to the

Georgia national under-21 football team The Georgia national under-21 football team is the national under-21 football team of Georgia and is controlled by the Georgian Football Federation. It is considered to be the feeder team for the senior Georgian national football team. The team ...

. He was also called up to the Russian team for the same dates, but he chose to represent Georgia. Sazonov took part in all four games of the

2023 UEFA European Under-21 Championship The 2023 UEFA European Under-21 Championship (also known as UEFA Under-21 Euro 2023) was the 24th edition of the UEFA European Under-21 Championship (27th edition if the Under-23 era is also included), the biennial international youth Association f ...

, scoring a header in a 2–0 win over

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

. Sazonov debuted with the senior Georgia national team in a friendly 3–0 loss to

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

on 17 November 2022.

Career statistics

Club

Honours

Zenit Saint Petersburg *

2020–21 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 ...

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Sazonov, Saba 2002 births Living people Georgian people of Russian descent Russian sportspeople of Georgian descent Russian men's footballers Footballers from Saint Petersburg Men's footballers from Georgia (country) Men's association football central defenders Georgia (country) men's international footballers Georgia (country) men's under-21 international footballers 21st-century sportsmen from Georgia (country) Russian Premier League players Russian Second League players Serie A players FC Zenit Saint Petersburg players FC Zenit-2 Saint Petersburg players FC Dynamo Moscow players Torino FC players Empoli FC players Expatriate men's footballers from Georgia (country) Russian expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Italy Expatriate sportspeople from Georgia (country) in Italy Russian expatriate sportspeople in Italy 21st-century Russian sportsmen