Aziz Salihu

Aziz Salihu (born May 1, 1954 in Pristina, Yugoslavia) is a retired Super heavyweight boxer of Kosovar Albanian descent. He represented Yugoslavia at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, California, and won the bronze medal in the super heavyweight division (> 91 kg), after a loss in the semifinals at the hands of Tyrell Biggs of the United States. Salihu also competed at the 1980 (Moscow) and 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, where he was eliminated in the quarterfinals.

Salihu is known and celebrated in Kosovo[a] and in all amateur boxing circles for having more than five hundred official matches and suffering only 26 losses. On club level Aziz had his best years while boxing for Prishtina. He was part of so-called golden generation and has achieved eight Yugoslav championship titles (including five in a row). He has also won international medals in many other championships, including first places in Mediterranean games and the World Cup in the year 1987. In Kosovo, he has received the Sportsman of the Century Award and now works as the coach and manager of Boxing Club Prishtina.

Opponents

He defeated boxer world and European champion Alexander Yagubkin in the tournament final in Belgrade (1980). Back to the tournament final in Belgrade (1984) he defeated the former world champion from Russia, Valery Abadzhyan. He has also beaten the world champion Francesco Damiani in the international tournament in Benghazi in Libya (1984). He win to Craig Payne, Ferenc Somodi, Håkan Brock, Marvis Frazier, Peter Hussing, Biaggio Chianese etc.

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