Not every Catalan player wants a theoretical duel. Many sidestep the sharpest main lines at move six, hoping a quieter set-up will hand them a small, nagging edge without a lot of memorization. Fighting the Catalan: A Complete Repertoire for Black – Part 2, by GM Michael Roiz and GM Petar Arnaudov, answers that hope with a single recurring counterpunch: the timely ...c5, striking at White's centre while his development still lags.
Where Part 1 covered the main lines after 6.O-O dxc4, Part 2 takes on everything else — the queen sorties, the early bishop developments, and the knight tours White uses to avoid the main paths. The unifying message is that none of these deviations changes Black's plan. Whatever White tries at move six, the central break is waiting.
Sequence: Roiz versus the Catalan »
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42m PGN Download Memory Booster Interactive Tests
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Ask a Catalan player where Black's difficulties really begin, and the answer is almost always the same: the light-squared bishop on c8. For decades it has been Black's problem, restricted behind its own pawns while White's fianchettoed counterpart controls the long diagonal unopposed. Fighting the Catalan: A Complete Repertoire for Black – Part 1, by GM Michael Roiz and GM Petar Arnaudov, is built around a single unifying idea — in every critical line, that bishop is given a purpose.
Sequence: Roiz versus the Catalan »
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1h 13m PGN Download Memory Booster Interactive Tests
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The Catalan built its reputation on a paradox. White frequently lets the c4-pawn go, trusting the fianchettoed bishop and a lead in development to pay it back with interest, and much of the opening's venom lives in that slow, pressure-filled squeeze. In his new course, GM Mahammad Muradli hands that logic straight back across the board.
With 4...c5, Black refuses to sit and be pressed. After 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.g3 c5, the move undermines White's center and creates tension, so that Black is never left absorbing the free, unopposed pressure the Catalan thrives on. And in the critical 5.cxd5 cxd4, it is Black who lets the material question wait — the plan, in Muradli's words, is to prioritize development over material.
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2h 34m PGN Download Memory Booster Interactive Tests
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GM Pier Luigi Basso and GM Andrea Stella's bundle covers three openings — the Express Najdorf for Black against 1.e4, the Queen's Gambit Accepted with 3...b5!? against 1.d4, and the Catalan Siege for White — built on a single principle: learn structures, not variations. Across 14 chapters and 30 test positions, the bundle delivers a complete tournament repertoire that a serious player can put to use over a weekend.
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2h 56m PGN Download Memory Booster Interactive Tests
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The second part of our six-month Réti project, covering everything after 1.Nf3 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3. A complete repertoire against the Queen's Gambit Declined, the Queen's Indian Defence, and the Hedgehog, built on understanding pawn structures rather than memorizing variations.
Sequence: Fianchetto Pawn Structures »
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6h PGN Download
10 Must-Know Games in the Catalan by GM Pier Luigi Basso is not a theory course. It is not a variation dump. It is a carefully curated tour through six decades of the sharpest, most instructive, most iconic Catalan battles ever played—games that reveal why this quiet diagonal remains the ultimate positional weapon at the highest level.
Sequence: Fianchetto Pawn Structures »
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3h PGN Download Interactive Tests
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The course's central idea is deceptively simple. After 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.g3 Be7 5.Bg2 0-0, Black's setup is so structurally clean that White must decide between accepting equality or overextending in search of an advantage. Muradli explains: "This is exactly the kind of line that Black may try if he wants to kill the game—there is a lot of theory, and as a result it's not easy for White to even get a playable position." The flipside? When White overpushes, Black's solid foundation provides the perfect launching pad for counterattacks.
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2h 16m PGN Download Memory Booster Interactive Tests
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The Opening Builder – Réti for White is not a traditional opening course. It is the starting point of a structured six-month project, designed for players who want to build a repertoire based on understanding rather than memorization.
Instead of learning long variations, the focus is on reaching the right structures and knowing how to play them.
The material is based on the February edition of the Repertoire Builder camp, now transformed into a complete digital product, including:
Sequence: Fianchetto Pawn Structures »
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6h PGN Download
The Catalan has long been one of White's most reliable weapons at the highest level: a quiet setup that accumulates small advantages, sidesteps sharp theory, and exploits Black's structural concessions over a long game. Yet elite practice over the past decade has quietly shifted the balance. Players like Fabiano Caruana and Vincent Keymer have demonstrated that 4...Bb4+ — the early check that defines this repertoire — is not a minor nuance but a genuine strategic weapon. By provoking White's pieces before the pawn structure fully crystallized, Black dictates the terms of the game rather than reacting to White's slow buildup. This course, built around that single provocative move, packages the resulting complex of ideas into a coherent, battle-tested system.
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3h 27m PGN Download Memory Booster Interactive Tests
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The Catalan is a positional opening, yet its subtlest battles are decided by a single tempo. When Black plays 4...Bb4+ before retreating the bishop to d6, White's bishop lands on d2 instead of staying on c1. This seemingly modest difference—one extra tempo with an already developed piece—creates a web of tactical and strategic nuances that separate preparation from improvisation. GM Alexey Dreev and GM Pier Luigi Basso's Play the Catalan - Part 4 completes their comprehensive White repertoire by addressing precisely these modern defensive setups that have become the weapon of choice for elite players in recent years.
Sequence: Catalan According to Dreev »
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3h 37m PGN Download Memory Booster Interactive Tests
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