Levan Kobiashvili

Nationality: Georgian
Date of birth: 10 July 1977
Association president since: 2015

• Levan Kobiashvili started at FC Metalurgi Rustavi and FC Dinamo Tbilisi, but spent most of his playing career abroad. After a year in Russia at FC Alaniya Vladikavkaz, the defender moved to Germany, where he played for SC Freiburg, FC Schalke 04 and Hertha BSC Berlin. He is second in the list of non-German players to have played the most matches in Germany's Bundesliga (351).

• He made his debut for Georgia on 1 September 1996 in a friendly against Norway in Oslo, and soon became a fixture in the team. His country's Footballer of the Year in 2000 and 2005, he become the first Georgian to reach a century of international caps when he took the field against Greece on 11 October 2011.

• Kobiashvili obtained a coaching licence and graduated from a sports management academy in Germany after ending his playing career in 2014. He was elected as president of the Georgian Football Federation (GFF) in October 2015. "This day is very emotional for me. I can only compare it with when I first came to see a football match, or when I received my first call-up to the national team," said Kobiashvili at the association's congress in Tbilisi.