Giorgi Dzmanashvili

He was banned three weeks for leading with an elbow on Antoine Dupont. Dupont did the same thing in the same match and was not cited at all.

In his first season of professional rugby, Giorgi Dzmanashvili started at Toulouse and led with an elbow in a hand-off on Antoine Dupont. He was cited. Dupont did the same thing in the same match and was not. Clermont appealed the three-week ban on exactly that basis and lost.

Tighthead prop at Clermont, 1.86m and 122kg, and a Georgia international.

Dzmanashvili came through RC Rustavi Kharebi and was promoted to their senior side in September 2021, playing the Didi 10 at No. 3. Georgia called him into an Under-20 camp in May 2022 for the Six Nations Summer Series and did not select him.

That July he moved to Clermont on an academy contract, to cover Sipili Falatea’s departure and Thomas Laclayat’s non-arrival. He was in pre-season friendlies within a month and on a Top 14 bench by round two, coming on for Cristian Ojovan when Rabah Slimani got hurt.

Then the suspension, and after it almost nothing: he did not appear again until the final round of the season. Six matches, one start. The year after was worse — nine appearances, all off the bench, and long stretches in the espoirs while Henzo Kiteau was preferred.

Clermont loaned him to Biarritz for 2024-25 to get him playing, and it half worked. He started at Montauban in round four and put a run of starts together before Achilles trouble began interrupting it. Fourteen matches, seven starts.

Georgia capped him on 13 July 2024, off the bench for Irakli Aptsiauri in a 25-23 win over Japan. He has one cap.

He qualified as a JIFF in June 2025. That is the French designation for a player developed inside the domestic system, and it changes what he costs a club against its squad quota. He went back to Clermont for 2025-26. That status is most of why he is worth a place.