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

Georgian Georgian may refer to: Common meanings * Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country) ** Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group ** Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians **Georgian scripts, three scrip ...

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 le ...

who played as a

centre-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield position whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Centre-backs are usually positioned in pairs, with one full-back on either s ...

Club career

Early years

Born in Tbilisi, Khocholava started his career in

Saburtalo Saburtalo might refer to: *Saburtalo Pantheon, burial site in Tbilisi, Georgia *Saburtalo Line, metro line in Tbilisi, Georgia * FC Saburtalo Tbilisi, football club in Tbilisi, Georgia *Saburtalo District Saburtalo is an administrative district ( ...

, where his first manager was Giorgi Devdariani. Later some of the members of his team, including

Valeri Kazaishvili The French name Valery () is a male given name or surname of Germanic origin ''Walaric'' (see Walric of Leuconay), that has often been confused in modern times with the Latin name ''Valerius''—that explains the variant spelling Valéry (). The S ...

Giorgi Chanturia Giorgi Chanturia ( ka, გიორგი ჭანტურია, ; 19 August 1959, in Tbilisi – 3 December 1994) was a Georgian politician and the National Democratic Party leader who was murdered in Tbilisi, Georgia in December 1994. He ent ...

and

Lasha Parunashvili Lasha Parunashvili ( ka, ლაშა პარუნაშვილი; born 14 February 1993) is a Georgian footballer who plays as a midfielder for Samtredia. International career Parunashvili made his debut for the national team in a frien ...

, 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. It was founded in 1925. Among its highest honors, is the European trophy earned by its football team which won the Cup Winners' Cup in 1981, beating FC Carl Zeiss Jena of East Germany 2–1 i ...

in 2011. He found it difficult to become a member of the starting line-up, having a six-month loan spell at Kolkheti Poti in order to get some more playing time. In 2014, he decided to leave Tbilisi-based club and moved to Shukura Kobuleti. He was offered to the club after the recommendation of famous Georgian footballer

Revaz Chelebadze Revaz Chelebadze ( ka, რევაზ ჩელებაძე) (born 2 October 1955) was a retired Georgian football player. He was nicknamed Chele (an allusion to Pelé), for his brilliant technical play and ability to score goals. The ...

, who played for Dinamo Tbilisi in Soviet era. 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. The club's home ground is the 34,164 capacity Chornomorets Stadium opened in 1935 and rebuilt in 2011. According to the club's website, it was formed in 1936 as ...

in summer 2015. He became the regular member of the starting line-up. He was named in the symbolic team of the Ukrainian Premier League in March 2017.

Shakhtar Donetsk

In April 2017, Shakhtar Donetsk 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 side

F.C. Copenhagen Football Club Copenhagen ( da, Football Club København, ), commonly known as FC København, FC Copenhagen, Copenhagen or simply FCK, is a professional Danish football club in Copenhagen, Denmark. FCK was founded in 1992 as a superstructure on ...

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 professional association football club based in Brøndbyvester, Capital Region of Denmark. The club was founded in 1964 as a merger between two local clubs and was p ...

. On 22 May 2022, with the club he won the Danish Superliga in the season 2021–22 and qualified for the UEFA Champions League 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 b ...

. 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 men's national Association football, football teams organized by FIFA. It took place in Russia from 14 June to 15 July 2018, after the country was awa ...

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

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Olimpi Rustavi *

Georgian Super Cup The Georgian Super Cup is a competition consisting of a single football match played between the champions of the Erovnuli Liga and the winners of the Georgian Cup. It was first held in 1996. When a club has won both competitions, the Georgian Cu ...

2010 File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...

Dinamo Tbilisi *

Georgian League Georgian may refer to: Common meanings * Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country) **Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group **Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians **Georgian scripts, three scripts ...

2012–13 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. I ...

* Georgian Cup:

Shakhtar Donetsk * Ukrainian Premier League: 2017–18, 2018–19, 2019–20 * Ukrainian Cup: 2017–18, 2018–19 *

Ukrainian Super Cup The Ukrainian Super Cup ( uk , Суперкубок України) 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 competiti ...

2017 File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a ser ...

Copenhagen * Danish Superliga: 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) 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