Negi develops the best strategy to overpower Kurt, but unfortunately Magia Eberea took it's tool on the user. Luckily for Negi that the backup plan was perfomed smoothly with Ku summoning a MASSIVE weapon to crush Kurt against the wall, and with the addition of Takamichi next chapter promises to be great. It either should have Rakan-Fate battle, Takamichi-Kurt battle or Nodoka revealing the "final" (hopefully) piece of the mistery about what happened to the Magical World.
PD: For those thinking Negi looked Naruto-ish due to the lightning clones, take in mind 2 things: He actually THOUGHT a strategy to use taking in mind both his and his opponet's strengths and weaknesses and also developed along ALONG WITH HIS PARTNERS a backup plan.