Nikolai Ahmed's pre-season.

[piza]

Catalunya entered this pre-season coming off a season to forget in the SSL Major Division. Although Ahmed had a pretty good individual performance in S21, Catalunya was bottom of the table, having won 3, drew 2, and lost 13. The squad also conceded a whopping 78 goals, more than the top 3 sides of S21 combined. 

Ahmed was quiet in the first pre-season match against Tokyo. Catalunya won this match 2-1, with two first half goals from J. Bonito and D. Barr just enough to secure the win. Nikolai didn't have any real impact on the goals, but managed an 88% passing completion rate. The second match was a much better showing from the midfielder however. Ahmed contributed to the last two goals, with one assist coming from the outside of the 18 on the right flank, a whipped cross for Z. Velstrazyn-Smith to head home, and the other assist coming from Nikolai cutting in from the right flank, running centrally outside the 18 once more and whipping another cross in for Z. Velstrazyn-Smith to head away and give Catalunya the lead against Romana.

Although the end result wasn't what the Catalunya side would've hoped for, conceding late to make the scoreline 4-4, Nikolai had a much better game against Romana than Tokyo, and will hope to make a streak of goal contributions from here on out.

[DivogoJota]

I greatly enjoyed the data utilized in the article, and felt it gave a strong backbone to the piece. However, the flow was a bit fast and some stylistic refinements would have helped make a more memorable article. That said, the dive into what Ahmed did on the pitch was compelling enough to convince me to give a 4/5 rather than a 3/5 in this case. You caught me on a good day!

4/5