Judo and Majlinda Kelmendi frontrunner of Kosovo at Olympic debut

The Rio Games will be the first to host athletes competing under the flag of Kosovo. For the first time Majlinda Kelmendi will carry the flag of her nation at the Olympic Games. During London 2012, judo double world champion Majlinda Kelmendi had to compete for Albania. Not this time in Rio. To pursue their careers before, many athletes from the small Balkan country had to leave their home towns to participate under another country's flag.

"It is big success for Kosovo that is represented for the first time with its flag," President Hashim Thaci said on Friday when he handed over the flag to Kelmendi. "This is the break of isolation from sport after almost three decades." Kosovo finally became member of the Olympic Committee in 2014. This year it joined UEFA and FIFA.

Majlinda Kelmendi is the best ambassador of Kosovo. Kelmendi was judo world champion in 2013 and 2014 and 2014 European Champion. She was double winner of the Grand Slam in Paris in 2015 and 2016, the most prestigious event in the world and she was appointed at an early stage as flagbearer for Kosovo at the these Olympic Games.

Besides Kelmendi also Nora Gjakova will be fighting. Nora Gjakova won European Games bronze in 2015. She was European Cadet and European U23 Champion. She won two Continental Opens in 2015, in Tunis and Lisbon and again in Tunis this year. Gjakova meanwhile won 11 World Cup medals. In 2016 she won bronze in Havana and silver in Tbilisi. All Kosovarian judoka are coached by Driton Kuka.

A lot of lobbying was done for years by Kosovo Olympic Committee head Besim Hasani. More than 70 countries and territories competing at the Olympics have yet to win a medal but Kosovo "deeply hopes" for success at its first try, he told to AFP. "Our adherence into the IOC has been the tip of an iceberg in the internationalisation of Kosovo’s athletes," Hasani said. Being in Rio will be "a new chapter" for Kosovo's sport, he added.

Summing up the jubilation of many, Hashim Thaci said last month on Twitter: "We may get gold, we may not, still #heroes."