Bulgaria defeated Serbia in the final of the Balkan Championship for men U20, which took place in Vrnjačka Banja, Serbia. Our team prevailed over our western neighbors with 3:1 (25:17, 22:25, 25:23, 25:21). The most dramatic was the fourth game, when Serbia pulled ahead by 6 points (10:16). Gradually, the Bulgarians strengthened their serve, the Serbians started to make mistakes, and after a good double block, our national team equalized (16:16). Several more equalizations followed, the last of which came from a block catch on Moni Nikolov's counter (19:19). The captain of Bulgaria quickly redeemed himself, hitting a strong serve, after which we organized a successful counter-attack. Moni then made an ace for 22:19.

After our team's net fault, the staff called a timeout. Despite Serbia's subsequent strong serve, Chipev handled the reception brilliantly and we scored 23:20 through the middle.

Kundev also executed a strong serve, followed by a softened opponent's attack from the block, and Velichkov's diagonal shot gave Bulgaria its first match point.

On the second attempt, the Bulgarians celebrated after Titriyski's attack down the line.

Bulgaria is the Balkan champion!

Our team started with the following lineup:
Simeon Nikolov, Kostadin Kozelov, Stiliyan Delibosov, Kristiyan Titriyski, Aleksandar Kundev, Nikolay Ivanov, and libero Kostadin Chipev. Almost all reserves entered the game.
Kristiyan Titriyski performed well and finished with 17 points (2 blocks). Right after him is captain Simeon Nikolov with 12 (1 block and 3 aces), some of his points were scored at the beginning of the second set when he briefly played as an opposite hitter. Konstantin Kozelov also performed well, adding 10 points (1 ace and 2 blocks). Kundev finished with 9 (1 block). In total, we made 12 scoring blocks and 8 aces, but again we have a large number of unforced errors (30). For the opponent, Luka Stanković was above all with 21 points (1 block).
Third place went to the team from Turkey, who defeated Greece 3:2 in the bronze medal match.
The idea of having the match officiated by referees from the same countries did not prove to be good. There were sparks of tension several times, and Moni Nikolov even got a yellow card. No matter how objective the referees are, the players and staff always have it in the back of their minds.