Nerd-er on the dance floor

The Kournikova of chess

Arianne Caoili (main image) with (inset from top) Danny Gormally and Levon Aronian. Main image courtesy Amiel Rosario.

There's making moves in chess and making moves in night clubs - and you wouldn't think the two would involve the same players.

Think again. To the staid world of chess comes . . . Gormallygate.

And at the centre of it is teenage Australian chess champion Arianne Caoili, dubbed "the Anna Kournikova of chess".

British chess grandmaster Danny Gormally had reportedly been seeing and emailing her.

But when he saw her dancing with the world's No. 3 player, Armenia's Levon Aronian, in a Turin nightclub during the World Chess Olympiad he made a move with his fist.

He subsequently left the Olympiad early of his own volition.

Now he might face action from the game's ruling body for the incident, which has sparked a feud between the English and Armenian teams.

Gormally, 30, from Durham, is ranked sixth in Britain.

Caoili, 19, has listed her likes on her website as: "Funny stories, The Cream, arguing, getting up to no good, shopping, quotes, tea, Pink Floyd album covers, dancing (all forms), chocolate, blitz, theatre, Karpov's games, Oreo's, black and dry humour, singing, good music, gravity (without it we're doomed), sunsets, sunrises, fine food (and fine boys), stars, moons, water, Edward Norton and Johnny Depp, grace, green lights, cooking, pina colada's, vodka, red wine, Kahlua, dwarfs and the odd Cuban cigar."

Allan Beardsworth, the English team captain, told Britain's Daily Telegraph: "The bottom line is [that] this is just a little incident in a nightclub where unfortunately Danny probably had a drink too many and obviously saw someone dancing with a girl he liked and either hit or tried to hit them."

Gormally, he said, was "gutted" when he awoke the following morning to realise what he'd done.

"He knows he shouldn't have done it and knows he wouldn't have done it normally."

Gormally and Beardsworth apologised to the Armenian delegation and their star player the morning after the incident but, while the apologies were being accepted, some of Aronian's teammates waded in with their fists.

Once they were told that Gormally had already said sorry, the Armenians apologised for their retaliatory attack.

"It was all very friendly," Mr Beardsworth said.

The English team came 19th in the biennial tournament, up from 30th place in 2004. The Armenian team won the tournament.

Beardsworth said that a captain's report would be sent to the English Chess Federation, and that he would be "surprised if the ECF didn't do something".

posted by The Vitamin's Blog @ 9:37 p.m.