Kvaratskhelia: 'Napoli was the decisive moment of my career'

Three days after his move to Paris Saint-Germain became official, the Georgian winger looks back on the leap from Russia to the top of European football and explains why the decision to join PSG took him no time at all.

by Gennaro SanninoThursday 24 September, 11:25 CET· 2 hours ago

Lo stadio Diego Armando Maradona di Napoli

Lo stadio Diego Armando Maradona — Foto: C.R. · CC BY-SA 3.0

Just three days have passed since 21 September, the date his move to Paris Saint-Germain became official, and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia has already chosen to look back. He did so with words about his years at Napoli that carry weight in the city: "When I arrived at Napoli it was a decisive moment in my career."

Kvaratskhelia describes a before and an after. The before was Russia, where he was playing when the top level of European football still looked like a distant dream: "My dream was to play for a big European club." The after was Napoli, which he treats as a test to pass rather than a goal already achieved: "I told myself: now you have a chance to prove to everyone that you deserve this level."

Georgia is part of the story too, and the weight of representing a country that had very few players across Europe's top five leagues: "We didn't have many players in the five major leagues, it seemed hard to imagine. But when I started playing I thought I had to give everything to aim for that level." Those are the words of a player who went from Napoli to becoming one of the names PSG made a priority to sign.

On the decision to join Paris Saint-Germain, Kvaratskhelia leaves no room for doubt: it came quickly, after a single face-to-face meeting with the club's leadership. "I had other offers, but when I spoke to the president and Luis Enrique I didn't hesitate for a second," he says. He adds the sharpest detail of all: "I told my agent and my father: don't even talk to the other clubs, I'm going there."

Quando sono arrivato a Napoli è stato un momento decisivo della mia carriera

There is a contrast a Napoli supporter can't help but notice: the same player who calls his time at Napoli a decisive moment in his career also describes closing the Paris deal without a second's hesitation. The two are not contradictory — a spell in Naples can have been a turning point while still leaving no doubts in front of Luis Enrique and Al-Khelaïfi's PSG — but it is a snapshot of a relationship that has already been filed away, at least in the priorities of the man who lived it on the pitch.

Kvaratskhelia still leaves behind a legacy that these latest comments do not erase: he was part of the squad, alongside the rest of the group, that brought the Scudetto back to Napoli in 2022-23. The present, though, points elsewhere: a different shirt, a different league, and his words now read as a closed chapter for a team with other concerns at this early point in the season.