Bahri_Kavaja
Bahri Kavaja
Albanian footballer
Bahri Ahmet Kavaja (23 August 1924 – 19 August 1987) was an Albanian football player who played for Vllaznia Shkodër and Dinamo Tirana as well as the Albania national team.[3]
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Bahri Ahmet Kavaja | ||
| Date of birth | (1924-08-23)23 August 1924[1] | ||
| Place of birth | Shkodër, Albania | ||
| Date of death | 19 August 1987(1987-08-19) (aged 62) | ||
| Place of death | Adelaide, South Australia, Australia | ||
| Position(s) | Defender | ||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| 1942–1949[2] | Vllaznia | ||
| 1949–1950 | Dinamo Tirana | ||
| International career | |||
| 1946–1950 | Albania | 13 | (0) |
| *Club domestic league appearances and goals | |||
He made his debut for Albania in an October 1946 Balkan Championship match against Yugoslavia and earned a total of 13 caps, scoring no goals. His final international was a June 1950 friendly match against Bulgaria.[4]
Defection
In September 1950 after a game in Hungary, he escaped his team along with Sulejman (Bule) Vathi after swimming the strait of Bosphorus, and did not return to the Communist regime in Albania, eventually settling in New Zealand.[5][6] He became a naturalised New Zealand citizen in 1965,[1] and died in Adelaide, South Australia, on 19 August 1987.[7]
- "New Zealand, naturalisations, 1843–1981". Ancestry.com Operations. Retrieved 10 January 2016.
- "Player Database". eu-football.info. Retrieved 2019-05-06.
- "Imigrimet e para të shqiptarëve në Zelandën e Re". Archived from the original on 2015-05-18. Retrieved 2015-05-08.
- "Deceased search results". Centennial Park Cemetery. Retrieved 10 January 2016.
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