Ex-tag team champ and WWE Hall of Famer Nikolai Volkoff dies aged 70

WWE Hall of Fame member and former tag-team champion Nikolai Volkoff has died aged 70.

Volkoff. whose real name was Josip Peruzovic, played a classic Russian heel during the Cold War era, joining forces with fellow "evil foreigner" The Iron Sheik in a tag team which held the championship for two-and-a-half months in 1985.

His in-ring career spanned the better part of 40 years and featured battles against babyface competitors such as Sgt Slaughter, Hulk Hogan and Bruno Sammartino.

As one of the greatest villains professional wrestling had ever seen, Volkoff's infamous rendition of the Soviet national anthem before his matches made him an instant icon in the eyes of the WWE Universe as a superstar they truly loved to hate.

Born in Croatia in 1947, Volkoff was trained and had his first run in Calgary in the late-1960s before a three-year run in the New York territory when it was run by Vince McMahon Sr. He won the WWWF's International tag-team titles alongside Newton Tattrie and also worked feuds with Sammartino and Bob Backlund as a singles competitor.

Volkoff also competed in AWA and Mid-South before returning to the north-east in 1984, where he made his biggest splash as an anti-American before eventually retiring in 1995.

Jim Ross inducted Volkoff into the WWE Hall of Fame as part of the class of 2005.