Georgian football mourns Ramaz Shengelia

Former FC Dinamo Tbilisi and USSR forward Ramaz Shengelia has passed away at the age of 55 after suffering a brain haemorrhage.

Shengelia started his career at FC Torpedo Kutaisi but made his name at Dinamo, where he won the Soviet title in 1978, the Soviet Cup in 1979 and the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup in 1980/81. He finished top scorer in the Soviet Top League with 23 goals in 1981 and was twice named player of the year in the USSR. Overall, he struck 120 goals in 283 league games for Dinamo and ten in 26 outings for the USSR, whom he represented at the 1982 FIFA World Cup.

During the 1990s, Shengelia worked for the Georgian Football Federation (GFF) and was the national team's general manager. He left his post ten years ago because of health problems. "Ramaz Shengelia was rightly called one of the best forwards of his time as he had a natural goalscoring instinct," read a statement from the GFF. "His contemporaries say he changed the traditional approach towards taking goalscoring chances."