Courses (28)

Somewhere along the way, the Italian Game quietly changed character. The first three moves stayed the same — 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 — but the fourth became a slow d2-d3, and the Italian became known for patient maneuvering rather than early fireworks.
GM Mitrabha Guha's new course restores the Italian's older, faster character. The starting position is the familiar one, but at every crossroad, the repertoire takes the direct road rather than the quiet one.

Around 1610, the Italian master Giulio Cesare Polerio set down a knight sacrifice so violent that his countrymen named it after what it left on the board: the Fegatello, the "fried liver." Four centuries later, the same leap onto f7 is still one of the most direct ways to drag Black's king into the open. And the wider 4.Ng5 attack, rather than being refuted by modern engines, has been re-armed by them.

The move that sets it all in motion, 4.Ng5, looks almost like a beginner's lunge. That is exactly its value. From that moment every line revolves around a single square, f7, and Black is forced to solve concrete problems from the very first moves.

For decades, the Italian Game has been an awkward place to be as Black. The quiet maneuvering plans and the many move orders leave plenty of room to drift, and it is easy to end up passively placed with no clear idea. Movahed's answer sidesteps the heavily analyzed main lines that follow 4...Nf6. After 3...Bc5 he meets 4.c3 with the flexible 4...d6, lets White build the center with d4, and only then drops the bishop back to b6 — giving up a pawn to seize the initiative before White can consolidate.

While the Ruy Lopez dominated elite repertoires for decades, the Italian Game quietly grew into one of the most theoretically rich and practically flexible options for White. Its pawn structures offer genuine choice — the same opening suits positional grinders and aggressive players alike.

GM Pavel Eljanov has made the Italian a cornerstone of his White repertoire in recent years, with strong results to show for it. His new project on Modern Chess translates that firsthand experience into a structured, deeply analyzed body of work covering Black's responses to 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4.

The Italian Game has long been considered White's most natural route to a more comfortable game after 1.e4 e5 — but 3...d6 challenges that narrative. Where 3...Bc5 and 3...Nf6 meet the central play head-on, Black's modest third move conceals a radically different plan: the thematic ...f5 break, a resource unavailable in traditional Italian structures. This isn't passive defense. It's flexible, dynamic counterattacking chess built on a strategic foundation that transforms the typical Italian battleground into unfamiliar territory for White.

When Captain William Davies Evans introduced his gambit in 1827, he couldn't have imagined that nearly two centuries later, elite players like Hikaru Nakamura would employ the same ideas at the highest level. The Evans Gambit—4.b4 against the Italian Game—represents one of chess history's most audacious concepts: sacrificing material for rapid development and central control. Now, IM Kushager Krishnater revives this romantic weapon with modern precision in Italian Game for White - Evans Gambit, offering a complete repertoire that balances classical aggression with contemporary theoretical rigor.

While most players struggle through endless Marshall and Berlin theory, a quiet revolution has been unfolding in elite practice. GM Pier Luigi Basso's latest course reveals how top players like Praggnanandhaa, Caruana, and Pranav have transformed 1...e5 from a theoretical burden into a concrete, aggressive weapon built on two revolutionary ideas: the Nge7 Spanish and the ...d6 Italian approach. These aren't cosmetic improvements—they're fundamental rethinking of how Black should handle White's main tries.

When GM Jose Martinez Alcantara and GM Pier Luigi Basso published their first volume on the Italian Game, they introduced a weapon that top players genuinely feared: the Bg5 systems after 5...d6. The setup was quite uncomfortable that Black's best minds started searching for alternatives—any move order that could sidestep the main battlegrounds entirely. This second volume is the authors' response to those escape attempts. Where Part 1 established dominance in the main lines, Part 2 systematically deals with every modern sideline Black has developed to avoid the pressure. The message is clear: there are no safe havens, no comfortable transpositions, no escape routes left.

The Italian Game has quietly evolved from a beginner's opening into a battleground where world champions choose to fight. When Black plays 3...Bc5, developing actively and maintaining central tension, both sides face a critical choice: settle for familiar simplifications or dive into the complex, tension-rich positions where preparation and understanding separate the confident from the confused. GM Jose Martinez Alcantara and GM Pier Luigi Basso have built their three-part Elite Italian repertoire around a simple premise: Black's most popular setup isn't fully sound under pressure, and the 6.Bg5 system transforms computer evaluations of "0.00" into practical nightmares at the board.

The Italian Game has long presented Black players with a dilemma: face the mountain of sharp theory in the main lines, or navigate White's quieter setups that promise a nagging long-term advantage. GM Ioannis Papaioannou's Italian Game for Black - Deep Understanding offers a third path—one built on strategic frameworks rather than endless preparation. This isn't another repertoire demanding memorization of 30-move sequences. Instead, Papaioannou teaches how to think in these positions, providing the conceptual tools to handle White's numerous setups with confide