THE chess world is agog at the latest twist in the dispute between Norwegian world champion Magnus Carlsen and 19-year-old US grandmaster Hans Niemann.

Niemann is now seeking $100 million in a federal lawsuit alleging Carlsen and others have “destroyed his career” with false accusations of cheating, sending the controversy that has engrossed chess players and watchers for weeks to a whole new level.

Niemann filed the lawsuit in St Louis, Missouri, last week against Carlsen, who hinted not too subtly at the time that Niemann cheated during his upset win over Carlsen at September’s Sinquefield Cup tournament in St Louis.

Niemann is seeking damages from Carlsen; Carlsen’s company Play Magnus Group; online chess site Chess.com; Hikaru Nakamura, a US grandmaster who is an influential streaming partner on Chess.com; and Chess.com executive Danny Rensch.

The suit alleges the defendants worked together to defame and libel Niemann after his Sinquefield Cup win.

Niemann says tournaments have banned him, matches have been cancelled and chess schools won’t hire him because of the cheating accusations. The suit contends that Carlsen is seeking to preserve his status as the king of chess and to complete a deal with Chess.com to acquire Play Magnus for nearly $83 million.

The 31-year-old world champion, generally considered one of the greatest chess players ever, told NRK Norwegian TV on Monday: “I still focus on chess. And that won’t be used as an excuse, no matter how things go.”

Attorneys Nima Mohebbi and Jamie Wine claimed in a statement posted on Chess.com’s website that the lawsuit will hurt the game of chess, its players and its fans and said there is no merit to Niemann’s claims.

Niemann has previously admitted to cheating when playing online chess when he was 12 and 16 but has denied cheating since then and said he never cheated during in-person matches, but Carlsen said in a statement on Twitter late last month that he believed Niemann “has cheated more — and more recently — than he has publicly admitted.”

Chess.com issued a lengthy report earlier this month that backed this view: “We present evidence that Hans likely cheated online much more than his public statements suggest.”

But Carlsen has offered no evidence of Niemann cheating, and Chess.com’s evidence is based on data analysis: no-one has offered up a smoking gun.

The lawsuit contends that several independent sources and experts found no evidence that Niemann cheated in any of his games against Carlsen, including at the Sinquefield Cup.

In a statement published in September, the president of the International Chess Federation, Arkady Dvorkovich, said the governing body shared Carlsen’s “deep concerns about the damage that cheating brings to chess” and is prepared to investigate incidents “when the adequate initial proof is provided.”

Fetch the popcorn.