{"id":80953,"date":"2025-10-21T16:36:26","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T14:36:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/?p=80953"},"modified":"2025-10-21T18:07:18","modified_gmt":"2025-10-21T16:07:18","slug":"albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Albanian Ernest Merdanaj Crowned Balkan Taekwondo Champion for the Fifth Consecutive Year"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Albanian National Olympic Committee has announced that athlete Ernest Merdanaj has been declared Balkan Champion for the fifth consecutive year, confirming his dominance in the Taekwondo discipline at the regional level.<\/p>\n<p>The Balkan Taekwondo Championship took place in Dupnitsa, Bulgaria, with the participation of 747 athletes from 12 different countries.<\/p>\n<p>Albania delivered an excellent performance, ranking third overall in the final standings.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to Merdanaj, Gledis Buba also won the title of Balkan Champion, while Sidorela Likometi was declared Balkan Vice-Champion in the women\u2019s category.<\/p>\n<p>Other Albanian medalists:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Rubin Brusha \u2013 Second place<\/li>\n<li>Ema Kreshpa \u2013 Second place<\/li>\n<li>Dition Gjika \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<li>Rainer Pronja \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<li>Bernt Brusha \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<li>Klaudio Lekndreaj \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<li>Fatih Hoxha \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<li>Darel Marku \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<li>Aiden Hysa \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<li>Klean Rama \u2013 Third place<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Albanian National Olympic Committee has announced that athlete Ernest Merdanaj has been declared Balkan Champion for the fifth consecutive year, confirming his dominance in the Taekwondo discipline at the regional level. The Balkan Taekwondo Championship took place in Dupnitsa, Bulgaria, with the participation of 747 athletes from 12 different countries. Albania delivered an excellent [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":80954,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[153,1803],"tags":[243,151],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Albanian Ernest Merdanaj Crowned Balkan Taekwondo Champion for the Fifth Consecutive Year - Euronews Albania<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Albanian Ernest Merdanaj Crowned Balkan Taekwondo Champion for the Fifth Consecutive Year - Euronews Albania\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Albanian National Olympic Committee has announced that athlete Ernest Merdanaj has been declared Balkan Champion for the fifth consecutive year, confirming his dominance in the Taekwondo discipline at the regional level. The Balkan Taekwondo Championship took place in Dupnitsa, Bulgaria, with the participation of 747 athletes from 12 different countries. Albania delivered an excellent [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Euronews Albania\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/euronews.al\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-10-21T14:36:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-10-21T16:07:18+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/IMG_5881.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1147\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"694\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Nen Si\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@euronewsalbania\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@euronewsalbania\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Nen Si\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Nen Si\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/444d280f35e047949b7f0bc08093608f\"},\"headline\":\"Albanian Ernest Merdanaj Crowned Balkan Taekwondo Champion for the Fifth Consecutive Year\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-10-21T14:36:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-10-21T16:07:18+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/\"},\"wordCount\":141,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/IMG_5881.jpeg\",\"keywords\":[\"kryesore 1\",\"Kryesoret\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Albania\",\"Latest news\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/euronews.al\/en\/albanian-ernest-merdanaj-crowned-balkan-taekwondo-champion-for-the-fifth-consecutive-year\/\",\"name\":\"Albanian Ernest Merdanaj Crowned Balkan Taekwondo Champion for the Fifth Consecutive Year - 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