A Channel 4 Countdown champion accused of stabbing a rival contestant at a tournament is unfit to stand trial, a judge ruled today.

John Cowen, 31, was arrested after allegedly attacking Thomas Carey, a former Cambridge University maths student, with a knife at the Countdown in Blackpool event in the Lancashire resort last September.

The event is an annual tournament which pits former winners from the Channel 4 game show against each other.

Cowen was charged with section 18 wounding with intent and possession of a bladed article after Mr Carey, who is in his 20s, was taken to hospital for treatment. 

Today at Preston Crown Court, a judge ruled that Cowen - also a maths graduate -was unfit to stand trial based on an assessment by two psychiatrists.

Instead a finding of fact hearing will take place before a jury tomorrow, Judge Guy Mathieson told the court. 

Not guilty pleas will be entered on his behalf.

Cowen appeared in court via a videolink from the secure psychiatric unit where he is being treated.

Dressed all in dark grey, he sat in a chair throughout the proceedings with his hands clasped. 

Mr Carey was number three on the leaderboard going into last year's event, which he won in 2022.

But did not participate in the opening round following the alleged attack on September 14 last year.

Cowen, of Morecambe, Lancashire, made his debut on the Channel 4 show in 2017, scoring the third highest total of the whole series, as well as spotting the nine-letter word 'spreading'.

Appearing in Series 77, Cowen missed out on joining the 800 club by 1 point, but nonetheless achieved four centuries and performed well in the numbers' rounds - in which he chose six small numbers in every pick.

Having won all eight of his heat games to become an octochamp, he went on to appear in the series finals as the third seed in December 2017. 

But he lost in the semi-finals to Bradley Horrocks, the host of the Blackpool event, after he gave an incorrect solution to his final six small numbers selection.

Mr Carey, of Bingley, West Yorkshire, is also a celebrated octochamp of the TV gameshow, making his debut two years before Cowen, in June 2015, when he was a sixth form student. 

He topped the series rankings as the number one seed with an impressive 923 points from eight straight wins. 

He was the first contestant since 1986 to answer all eight conundrums correctly, but was unable to take his impressive form into the grand final and was eliminated at the semi-final stage.

In January 2019, both Mr Carey and Cowen took part in the Championship of Champions XV series, but never met having both lost to different opponents at the quarter final stage.

Both Cowen and Mr Carey are members of Apterous, a website which replicates the Countdown game online.

According to the website, Mr Carey, who is known as 'Maus', has been a member since 2011 and is 'known for wearing a tea cosy on his head'.

It says he has been the organiser of the annual Apterous Masters tournament since 2019, and also won the 2018 tournament.

The site makes no comment about any Blackpool incident simply saying that Mr Carey was 'unable to participate in the opening round'.