With the retirement of former ozeki Tochinoshin this week, the curtain has fallen on 22 years of Georgian involvement in professional sumo.
A native of Mtskheta ¡ª the oldest continuously inhabited European city outside of Greece and Cyprus ¡ª Tochinoshin (real name Levan Gorgadze) was the youngest and most successful of the four Georgian rikishi that joined ¨³ú³Ü³¾´Ç between 2001 and 2006.
Although Gorgadze initially struggled to find a stable willing to give him a shot, the former junior world medalist quickly rose up the ranks once he made it into the professional game.
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