SCOTLAND fans with long memories are likely to have Georgia weighing on their mind as the days count down to Saturday at Ibrox.

This often-underestimated, conflicted little part of the Caucasus had a crucial role to play in the epic national near miss in Euro 2008 qualifying, and if manager Temuri Ketsbaia has his way, their involvement in our France 2016 bid could be no less traumatic.

For some, the home match in March 2007 was bad enough. Alex McLeish's first match in charge after taking over from Walter Smith saw the Scots living on their wits, a Kris Boyd strike evened out by former Rangers star Shota Arveladze. So it stayed at Hampden until the 89th minute, when Craig Beattie scrambled in a winner.

But in truth we were just getting started. Scotland travelled to the return match in Tbilisi that October fresh from having completed the double over France. But clad in unflattering all-maroon strips, our momentum was squandered in the Boris Paichadze Stadium. Not exactly helped by the scheduling of an Old Firm match for the following weekend - and some not-entirely co-incidental call-offs from Alan Hutton, Scott Brown and Lee McCulloch, while Gordon Strachan was Celtic boss - McLeish's side tumbled 2-0 to a Georgia side featuring three teenagers.

We couldn't chart a way past 17-year-old goalkeeper Giorgi Makaridze, a man who had yet to play a single match for Dinamo Tbilisi, the first goal was scored by 17-year-old striker Levan Mchedlidze, while the midfield scheming work was done by another kid who should still have been in school, 16-year-old Levan Kenia of Schalke. The result meant it was win or bust against Italy on the final day, and despite a valiant effort, it was to be the latter.

By rights those three talented teenagers should be in their prime seven years on, but it says something for the turmoil which can afflict this rather chaotic country that only one, Mchedlidze, of Empoli - a late sub in the 2-1 defeat to the Republic of Ireland last month - is in the squad enlisted by Ketsbaia for Ibrox. Georgia tend to have the whip hand over Scotland at youth level, though, and marshalled by Jaba Kankava of Dnipro, this is a young squad full of unpredictable talent. Jano Ananidze, a former team-mate of Aiden McGeady's at Spartak Moscow, is the star turn, while the fine individual goal against the Irish from 22-year-old Tornike Okriashvili, who now works under McLeish at Racing Genk, illustrated what he has to offer.

"I remember that Scotland lost the game and ended up not qualifying in the end," Ketsbaia told the Sunday Herald. "But there were some strange decisions: to give 16 or 17-year-old players a game. That was seven years past so many things have changed and unfortunately for us they have not changed for the better. But we made some big decisions two years ago, and we tried to pick a new team with young players and we will try to get the best possible out of them. This time we have players who are 19, 20, 21-years-old. It is not going to be easy but we are ready for this kind of game.

"We knew from the beginning that this campaign was going to be difficult for us," he added. "When you play against teams that are challenging to finish second or third in the group, it is not that they are must-win games, but what you have to do is not lose the games. Unfortunately we lost a game [against the Republic of Ireland] that we shouldn't have lost."

As unpredictable and unheralded as they are, Georgia's last competitive away win came in August 2006 against the Faroe Islands. They have lost 15 and drawn four of the 19 they have contested since then. It will be a bad sign indeed if Ketsbaia is seen smashing the Ibrox advertising hoardings, as he used to do as a player, in celebration on Saturday.