Going down the pub with their checkmates: At the King's Head, the hot topic is not Gooch or Gower but Short and Kasparov. Imogen Edwards-Jones enjoys a knight out at London's largest chess club

FROM among the Pimm's flags, the red, white and blue bunting, deer antlers, decorative plates and golden trophies came a mysterious clattering. In a corner of the King's Head pub, in Bayswater, west London, a group of people were bent double over chequered tables, heads grasped in hands, as they silently and swiftly swiped knights, pawns and queens, attempting to capture the king.

Chess arrived at the King's Head in the late Sixties, under the influence of Bill Raines, an American who wanted to revive the atmosphere of the great London chess clubs of the 19th century. It has survived various landlords, who put up with the constant clatter and modest drinking habits of the players, to become one of the world's most famous chess hangouts. Now run by Andrew Whiteley, who used to be a member of the British chess team 'when they didn't win', it has more than 120 regular members and is London's largest chess club, with games played on the pub's low tables every night.

Games progressed at a furious pace, opponents hardly raising their eyes from the boards. There was little or no conversation, as they manoeuvred the pieces to gain an advantage. However, when they did stop thwacking vanquished pieces on the squat, wooden and brass timers that were placed between them, the subject on everyone's lips was Nigel Short. Everyone in the pub nurtured some private theory about the world chess championship between the British challenger and Garry Kasparov, to be played in Manchester next September. 'Kasparov, well, he's crazy. He plays risky chess,' said Emirham, the Istanbul chess champion, as he took his opponent's pawn. 'Nigel plays Karpovian chess, he gives you something to capture, but he always knows exactly what he is doing. But I don't think that he can beat Kasparov.'

Over on the next table, Colin, 36, was stroking his beard as he fought off the challenges of Jeff, a 10-year-old American in a baseball cap who was in London on holiday. Jeff's father stood watching proudly over his prodigy, his pint glass resting on his stomach. Jeff, who came third in the US National Elementary Chess Championship, was doing rather well considering that Colin has written about chess, tutors in chess, plays international competitive chess, reads chess books on the way home on the Tube and once held a nine-year-old Nigel Short to a draw.

'I played him again later, when he was 14 and close to being a master,' Colin explained. 'I was in a good position and then he began to think and suddenly pulled away.'

Colin said he thought that Short stood a chance at the world championship. 'I don't think that it will be a complete wipe-out. The grandmasters aren't as sharp as they used to be.'

Apart from Nigel Short, the hot topic of the evening was Judit Polgar, the 16-year-old Hungarian prodigy and youngest ever International Grandmaster.

'I think she's gorgeous,' said Steve, 23, a self-confessed 'crap player', with long red hair and large spectacles. 'She speaks so many languages.'

Colin said that he had been in a winning position against her in a recent tournament in Hastings, East Sussex, but had ended up losing both games. 'Once seen, hard to ignore,' was the verdict of Andrew, who arrived in the pub having just won a game against a women's master and champion of Kazakstan, who now plays for a team from Hackney, east London. He was so excited that he could not light the knight-shaped pipe which he absent-mindedly fiddled with. 'Judit is a great role model for women,' he said.

There was only one woman playing at the tables in the King's Head. 'It's something to do with the left and the right sides of the brain,' said Andrew. 'Which means that men are better.'

Selina, 24, a secretary and the recent Rabbits champion (that's chess jargon for less advanced) of the King's Head, disagreed. She found the male domination of the sport off-putting. 'Men always want to win and women have better things to do,' she said, as she whipped her boyfriend's pieces off the table. She plays in the pub four or five times a week. 'We come out for a quiet night of chess and end up arguing all the way home.' Her boyfriend laughed.

Andrew had another theory. 'The Queen used to be the weakest piece on the board,' he said, 'until the monstrous regiment of women came to the thrones of Europe in the second half of the 16th century - Queen Elizabeth I and Catherine De' Medici - and then she became the most powerful. The thing is, when women do turn up, they end up winning.'