One of the Top heavyweight BJJ blackbelts, Igor Silva may not be competing this year in the Abu Dhabi World Professional Jiujitsu Championship, but hes on the ground and attending! In an exclusive video interview with ArabsMMA, Silva stated his predictions about who will be the winners in the black belt divisions this year.

Silva also shared his thoughts on the introduction of the Country Qualifiers (CQ) to this years Abu Dhabi World Pro. For those not aware of this new change, here’s how the UAEJJF want things to work from now on.

The notion of country qualifiers is that instead of what has been happening in the last 10 years at Abu Dhabi World Pro, especially in the brown and black divisions, where same country competitors such as the Brazilians who have dominated among themselves. Now attempting to implement one spot per nationality, those from the same country will compete against each other for a spot in the main bracket.

WORLD PRO COUNTRY QUALIFIERS, HOW IT WILL WORK BY FLOGRAPPLING.COM

*Only two athletes per country will be allowed in each weight class of the World Pro (at brown and black belt)

*The athlete with the highest ranking will automatically qualify to the World Pro, all others will have to go through the Country Qualifier (CQ) mini tournament to conquer the second vacancy.

Example: José Junior is ranked #1 in the under 110 kg category of UAEJJF’s ranking. He gets the 1st Brazilian vacancy of that weight class, all other -110kg Brazilian athletes will compete among themselves for the 2nd spot.

The CQ will take place on Thursday, April 20. The Abu Dhabi World Pro will start the following day (April 21).
The two same-country athletes qualified for the World Pro will be placed on the same side of the brackets, and if they conquer their way to through the tournament, they will meet in the semi finals (see image below). Meaning that there will be no finals between countrymen or countrywomen.