Olympic medallist Hugh Russell dies aged 63

Irish Olympic bronze medallist and former British bantamweight and flyweight champion boxer Hugh Russell has died, aged 63.

Russell won bronze for Northern Ireland at the 1978 Commonwealth Games in Edmonton, Canada and two years later took bronze for Ireland at the Moscow Olympics.

The Belfast man won three bouts in Moscow, seeing off Iraq’s Samit Khiniab 5-0 in the Round of 32; beating Emmanuel Mlundwa of Tanzania by the same score in the last 16 before reaching the semi-final with a narrow 3-2 defeat of North Korea’s Yo Ryon-Sik.

Russell then ran into dominant Bulgarian Petar Lesov in the last four, going down 5-0 to the eventual gold medallist. Lesov would win the gold medal via TKO over USSR representative Viktor Miroshnichenko.

Russell turned professional after Moscow and competed from 1981 to 1985. He retired as undefeated British flyweight champion.

After his career in the ring, he became an accomplished photographer working with the Irish News newspaper.

The paper’s sports editor, Paul McConville, said of his former colleague: “Champion boxer and top-class photographer but a friend and colleague who was always on hand to lend some sage advice or lighten the mood with a wise crack and that cheeky grin. RIP Champ.”