 Grandmaster Eugenio Torre, who was in the line-up of the Philippines for a record twenty-three times between 1970 and 2016 and was the highest-scoring player at the 42nd Chess Olympiad, decided not to play and was named coach of the Philippines national team in the open section.Former FIDE World Champion Veselin Topalov did not play because a dispute between chess officials caused de-recognition of the Bulgarian Chess Federation by FIDE.This was the first time Russia had not been the top-ranked team before the start of a Chess Olympiad since their first entry in 1992 following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, conceding the top spot to the United States, who were defending the title won at the previous Olympiad.