Hadi Srour

Srour initially had a love for football, but joined the TK boxing club in his hometown of Tønsberg at the age of nine with his brother Amin and cousin Ali.^[6] He competed as a youth until 2014, winning a gold medal at the 2013 Nordic Championships and three consecutive national championships at that level. In 2014, he was the lightweight national champion in both the youth and senior divisions.^[7][8]

In 2015, Srour lost to Salavat Khatujev in the national championship finals.^[9] He defeated Jacob Gabriel by split decision in the finals of the Haringey Box Cup in England,^[10] but then suffered a quick exit at the European Championships in Bulgaria with a first-round loss to the more experienced Florentin Niculescu.^[11] Srour repeated as a silver medallist at the national championships in 2016.^[12] He also won a bronze medal at the Nordic Championships and suffered a first-round exit in the European Olympic Qualification Tournament at the hands of Batuhan Gözgeç.^[13][14]

In 2017 he won his second senior national title, moving up to welterweight and defeating Ruslan Sjidokaev in the final for the gold.^[15] A few weeks later he won the light-welterweight gold medal at the Nordic Championships, where he was also won the award for best senior male athlete.^[16] However, he suffered a quarterfinal exit at the European Championships and a first-round loss to Freudis Rojas at the World Championships.^[17][18] He finished the year by winning the King of the Ring Tournament in Sweden, once again moving up to welterweight and knocking out Nordic champion Adolpe Sylva in the semi-finals before beating the 2016 King of the Ring, Alex Bishop, in the title fight. He was named the best boxer of the tournament.^[19] For his multiple gold-medal performances, local publication Tønsbergs Blad awarded him the Kristinastatuetten given to the Vestfold region's athlete of the year.^[6]

Srour repeated as national and Nordic champion in 2018.^[20][21] He won his last national title in 2019, defeating Yusof Mohammed Abid in the finals.^[22] He also competed at the European Games that summer, which doubled as the 2019 European Championships, losing in his first fight against Eskerkhan Madiev.^[23]

Srour made his professional debut on 3 February 2018, defeating English journeyman Michael Mooney by third-round technical knockout (TKO) in Arendal.^[73] He finished Artur Zemlianyi in the same fashion a few months later in Oslo.^[74] In early 2019 he defeated Zoltan Szabo by unanimous decision (UD) to move to 3–0, joining Sauerland Promotions on a three-year deal soon thereafter.^[75] In his first fight under the Sauerland banner on 17 August 2019, he won a unanimous decision over Russian fighter Evgenii Vazem in Germany.^[1]

In September 2019 it was announced he had failed a drug test taken in July when traces of synthetic erythropoietin, also known as EPO, were found in his urine; he was subsequently dropped from the 2019 World Championships by the Norwegian Boxing Federation.^[76][77] He was accused of taking the "blood booster" following his loss in the European Games and before his professional fight in Germany.^[78] His only explanation was that he could have accidentally ingested something at Stavernfestivalen, the music festival he attended the day before the test.^[79]

Anti-Doping Norway recommended a four-year ban from the sport for Srour after he maintained his innocence and refused to confess.^[80] He appeared before the Norwegian Sports Confederation prosecution committee in September 2020, hiring a team of professors to present an expert report that disputed the positive test results.^[81] He was finally convicted in November and given the maximum sentence of a four-year ban.^[4]