After a disappointing 1-1 draw against Greece in Granada, Spain will be looking to claim their first win of their 2022 WC qualifying campaign when they travel to Tbilisi to take on Georgia.
La Furia Roja had finished 2020 with an emphatic 6-0 win over Germany, and coach Luis Enrique opted for virtually the same lineup against the Greeks, with the only difference coming in the form of Eric Garcia and Marcos Llorente starting in the back four instead of Pau Torres and Sergi Roberto.
Interestingly, Spain’s starting XI in Granada against Greece featured no Barca player and only 1 from Real Madrid in the form of skipper Sergio Ramos, who played the first half before being withdrawn. They took the lead through Alvaro Morata in the 33rd minute, but Greece equalized through a second half penalty from Bakasetas following a mistake from Ramos’ replacement Inigo Martinez- also their only shot on target in the full 90.
FT stats Spain 1 Greece 1
The Greeks were playing on the 200th anniversary of their independence, and it showed in their performance- Spain dominated possession (near 80%) and chances, but were simply unable to fashion a way through as the visitors came away with an unlikely looking point to boost their own qualification hope
Spain will now turn their attention to Georgia, who were beaten 1-0 by Sweden in their group opener. While Georgia are underdogs, they will have home support, with the stadium expected to be at around 30% capacity. This football match will be on tv– Sky are airing the game at 5pm, and Spanish fans will be hoping that their team doesn’t drop more points in the group given that Sweden have already got a head-start.
Two of Llorente’s new call-ups- Pedri and Bryan Gil, both made their international debut against Greece. The duo came on at the same time, replacing Sergio Canales and Dani Olmo. Gil, the first Eibar player to ever represent La Roja, was in particular very impressive in the half odd hour that he was on the pitch.
Georgia are winless in their last six international games and are huge underdogs here, but it’s worth noting that they haven’t lost by a margin of more than a single goal since June 2019. There have been some impressive results in that period, including goalless draws against both Denmark and the Republic of Ireland at home.
The home side recently appointed veteran French defender Willy Sagnol as their coach- his first game in charge was the loss to Sweden. Things could however have been different for Sagnol and Georgia had Giorgi Qvilitaia not missed a glorious early chance to put the visitors ahead, and Sweden eventually prevailed thanks to Viktor Claesson’s goal, set up by the returning Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
Last meeting
Georgia, tough as it might be to believe, actually beat Spain in the last meeting between the two sides- a friendly in Getafe back in 2016 before the Championships. The two sides also met in qualifying for the 2014 World Cup- Spain needed a 86th minute winner from Roberto Soldado to beat them 1-0 in Tbilisi then, and followed it up with a 2-0 win at home.