Merab Sharikadze, the former captain, received an 11-year suspension for providing out-of-competition urine samples for teammates Miriani Modebadze, Lasha Lomidze and Otar Lashkhi. Shamatava also received a nine-year ban.
Giorgi Chkoidze has been suspended for six years, while teammates Lasha Khmaladze, Lashkhi and Modebadze all received three-year suspensions, which expire next year. Lomidze has already served a nine-month suspension for providing a clean sample for Chkoidze.
Who orchestrated it?
World Rugby’s investigation does not specify or uncover who initiated the urine-swapping scheme, but it makes clear that Shamatava was the main person behind it.
It found that she “assisted and/or facilitated four players, namely Miriani Modebadze, Lasha Lomidze, Otar Lashkhi, and Merab Sharikadze in the commission of the sample substitution” between February 2022 and June 2023.
In Sharikadze’s evidence, the former captain said that Shamatava approached him on each occasion, either by text message or in person, to request a clean sample. Furthermore, Shamatava would issue warnings to players about forthcoming out-of-competition tests.
What was Sharikadze’s role?
There is no indication that Sharikadze ever took an illicit substance. Every one of the samples he provided on behalf of his teammates was clean or in anti-doping language did not produce an “atypical finding or adverse analytical finding”.
However, it is understood that World Rugby singled Sharikadze out for the longest ban because he was captain of the team and responsible for setting the culture and environment in which the offences took place.
Unlike the other players, he disputed the sanction applied to him and requested a hearing before the World Rugby Judicial Committee. That hearing was held on October 24, 2025.
What was the evidence?
One of the key revelations in World Rugby’s investigation was that Shamatava would post details of upcoming doping tests on a group chat containing 26 players.
Out-of-competition tests are supposed to be a secret so potential dopers can be caught out, but World Rugby found that she “informed the recipients of the names of the players selected for each testing mission, and the dates on which those players would be tested. This conduct severely undermined the doping controls, as no-advance notice testing is a core component of an effective anti-doping protocol”.
How did World Rugby uncover it?
The investigation began when certain irregularities were detected in urine samples by World Rugby’s athlete passport management programme, which monitors selected biological variables over time.
Together with Wada, World Rugby began analysing the DNA of historic samples from Georgian players in their long-term storage. This investigation found Sharikadze had been providing samples on behalf of his teammates.
What are the drugs in question?
World Rugby’s initial assumption was that the urine-swapping scheme was covering up the use of performance-enhancing drugs. However, it found no evidence that this was the case. Instead, all signs pointed towards players using cannabis and tramadol, a painkiller that was only officially added to Wada’s banned list in 2024.
What happens now?
While there are parallels with Russia’s elaborate urine-swapping scheme at the 2014 Winter Olympics, the key differences are that the Sochi scandal was orchestrated by the highest echelons of the Government and involved performance-enhancing drugs.
Meanwhile, World Rugby found the Georgia Rugby Union had no role in this plot, but fined it a significant six-figure sum for bringing the sport into disrepute.
Although it falls a long way short of the ultimate punishment of being thrown out of next year’s World Cup, that financial punishment is significant for an emerging nation such as Georgia.
It is never a good look for any sport to go through a doping scandal, but World Rugby believes that uncovering this scheme is proof that even sophisticated plots can be unearthed, which will act as a further deterrent to potential dopers.
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