Mercedes-Benz CLA250 vs Lotus Emeya

What's the difference?

If you're after a hot hatch with a boot, you can't have one because it wouldn't be a hatch anymore.

What you can have is this little beast - the new, second-generation Mercedes-AMG CLA 45 S, a small coupe-style sedan sharing its high-performance DNA with the hot as bubbling lava A 45 S hatch.

Packing 300kW – that's just over 420hp – and 500Nm its 2.0-litre engine is claimed to be the most powerful series production turbo four ever made.

And Australian deliveries are scheduled for early 2020, with a likely price tag in the mid-$90k bracket.

Mercedes-AMG invited us to the car's global launch in Madrid, Spain, where we got behind the wheel on road and track.

The third film in a trilogy is often the hardest to get right - Return of the Jedi is not as acclaimed as The Empire Strikes Back.The Godfather III is nowhere near as revered as its predecessors.

Which I mention because we’ve come to the end of our Lotus trilogy, as regular readers may have noticed in recent weeks we have tested the Emira and Eletre.

This time we’re driving the Emeya, the third and final member of the brand’s new line-up (at least for now) that manages to combine elements of both its stablemates.

The Emeya is Lotus’ direct rival to the Audi e-tron GT and Porsche Taycan, an electric sports sedan that takes elements of the Emira’s dynamics and pairs it with the Eletre’s powertrain and style.

So let’s find out how this final installment of the Lotus trilogy has a happy ending or not…