The winners of the awards for the best individual scores from last season have been announced.

In division 1, Jon Manley’s 7.5/8 helped City 1 retain their title and he wins the first division award.

In the second division, Phillip Hayward played all 12 games for City 2 but even his impressive and medal-winning 10.5/12 was not enough to deny Cowley 2 the top spot.

Graham McInnes could not have done much more for his team than his 10/10 for Didcot 2, who finished third in division 3, and his score wins the trophy for that league.

Jeffrey Yu’s superb 9/10 wins the division 4 award and helped City 5 to take the division 4 title. Among the excellent Everyman Chess publications this summer, I would highlight Timothy Taylor’s Alekhine Alert and Simon Williams’ instructive How to Win Quickly at Chess as worthy of study.

However, the book that has really grabbed my attention is Yasser Seirawan’s Chess Duels.

The production values of this hardback are a step above the usual — a sure sign that Everyman think they are on to a winner. American grandmaster, Seirawan, was a top-ten player in his day. Chess Duels is the story of every game and encounter he had with the World Champions: Fischer, Smyslov, Tal, Petrosian, Spassky, Karpov and Kasparov.

There are many great stories — of dinners with Tal and arguments with Kasparov — told with honesty and wit, and in the well annotated games, Seirawan mostly gives as good as he gets.

Not in the following game though — played in the 1984 Zurich Open — where the tenth World Champion is too good.

White: Boris Spassky Black: Yasser Seirawan 1.e4 d6 The Pirc was a favourite of Seirawan’s — though he prefers to call it ‘The Rat’. 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.Nf3 Bg7 5.h3 0–0 6.Be3 a6 7.a4!? b6!? 8.Bc4!? Bb7 9.e5!? Forced, according to Seirawan.

9…Ne4 10.Nxe4 Bxe4 11.Ng5!? Again, Seirawan says White does not have a choice.

Bxg2 12.Rg1 Bc6 13.Qg4! e6 14.0–0–0 Nd7 15.h4 dxe5 16.dxe5 Qe7 17.Rxd7! A radical way of meeting the threat to his e5 pawn and Seirawan gives the alternative 17.f4 a question mark.

17…Bxd7 18.h5 f5? It is a standard defensive idea to defend along the rank but here it is a bad move and 18...b5! was much better.

19.Qh3 f4! 19...gxh5 was necessary, but after 20.Qxh5 h6 White is better.

20.hxg6! Bxe5? This is the final error and so the most significant. After 20...h6 21.Bd2 Black can fight on.

21.Nxe6! Bxe6 22.Bxe6+ Kg7 22...Kh8 23.Rh1 is not better.

23.gxh7+ 1-0.

l Former Wantage Club star, Csaba Koszta, played just two games last season — for Cumnor in division 3 — but he proved he is still a class act by winning the Cowley Summer Blitz with a perfect score of 10/10.