User:Amaliazhivago/Borna Derakhshani

Borna Derakhshani, born on the 10th of February 2002, is an Iranian chess player representing the United Kingdom since April 2018 as a World Chess Federation Master (FM).

Country -  Iran / UK

Born -     10/02/2002

Title -  Fide Master/World chess federation master

Rating -  2373

Chess career in Iran :

Borna Derakhshani was chess youth champion in Iran and won a silver medal in the individual Asian chess championship in 2012. Borna also won several youth open international tournaments including Biel Switzerland, Abu Dhabi in 2013/ 2014/ 2015, the Youth international in Gibraltar, August 2017 and Asian youth team chess championship in China 2016 / silver medal on board 2/.

Conflict with Iranian chess federation :

In February 2017 Iranian chess federation banned Borna Derakhshani from playing for Iranian youth national team or any other tournament in Iran because he played against an Israeli grand master, Alexander Huzman, in the first round of the international Gibraltar chess tournament in January 2017. It is known in Iran that Iranian sportsman should not play against Israel because Iran doesn’t recognize Israel as a official country.

Move to UK:

After he got banned and received several bad press from the news, media and authorities, Borna never had gone back to Iran again ( since February 2017 ). He moved to the UK with a child student visa and studied in one of the best international boarding school in the UK. Borna switched from the Iranian chess federation to the UK chess federation. He won British youth chess championship Under 16 in 2018 and won Under 18 in 2019, including won a silver medal and second was placed second in the Under 21 British chess championship. Borna represented the UK national team in 2019 the European team youth chess championship where he finished second on Board 2. He also a member of 4ncl IUK super league, playing for the Wood Green team.