How Salem Saleh became one of the best chess players in the UAE – News

Master title in 2009

Salem Abdulrahman Mohamed Saleh, arguably one of the most exciting chess players to emerge from the UAE in recent years, realized his passion for chess early on while growing up in Sharjah.

By the time he was a teenager, he was already full of enthusiasm and purpose for his future as a chess player. He was focused and started to spend a lot of time thinking about the kind of player he wanted to be.

Saleh is confident and never doubts that he is ready to enter the next chapter of his life at the chessboard. In short, he was ready for adult chess when most kids his age were still unsure of who they wanted to be.

By the age of 14, Saleh had won his first Asian youth title, which he also won at the age of 16 and 18. At this stage, he would go on to dominate the Arab chess world and was a three-time Arab chess champion, winning his first title in 2008 at the age of 15. In the same year, he won his first UAE chess tournament, and in 2009 he was awarded the title of Grandmaster.

Saleh has been on the elite list of the world’s top 100 players since 2016, ranking as high as No. 44, with the highest rating he achieved last year of 2,690. He will remain in this position until March of this year and be certified in Fide’s monthly ranking list.

Saleh’s watershed moment came when he began working with renowned Dutch-Bosnian chess coach Ivan Sokolov, who would help him break into the world’s elite. Sokolov recently charted the path for a young Uzbekistan to win the 44th World Chess Olympiad in India.

Salem and Sokolov locked their partnership in early 2013, when Salem was already a full-fledged guru determined to break into Fide’s top 100 ratings. At 2500 seconds in total, Salem needed to take his game to the next level and score 2600, which he did, even winning the Asian chess championship in Al Ain.

In November 2016, Salem finally broke into the top 100 with a rating of 2,656, a position that has remained up to date.

Speaking on the coaching website sokolovchampionsacademy.com about his alliance with Sokolov, Saleh said: “At the beginning of our partnership my rating was 2500, by the end it became 2620 and I won Asia gold medal.”

“But more importantly, my chess is better and more fun!”

— Reporter @khaleejtimes.com