Background
Born Erbach im Odenwald, Hessen, West Germany, Nikolov grew up in Sandbach in Hessen, starting playing football with local SG Sandbach.
Born Erbach im Odenwald, Hessen, West Germany, Nikolov grew up in Sandbach in Hessen, starting playing football with local SG Sandbach.
He spent nineteen seasons with Eintracht Frankfurt, appearing in 413 official games over the course of 13 Bundesliga seasons (19 overall). At nearly 17 he joined Eintracht Frankfurt"s youth system, going on to remain with the club until his retirement. Nikolov started his senior career as backup, first to Uli Stein and then Andreas Köpke.
Football Club Kaiserslautern.
In February 2007, after Pröll relapsed from his rib injury, he was reinstated by manager Friedhelm Funkel, contributing with 20 games to the team"s permanence in the top level In January 2010, it was announced that the 35-year-old Nikolov would not renew his contract with Eintracht that was due to expire in the summer, but he eventually signed a new deal until 2012, and later until 2013. In June 2013, Eintracht revealed that the goalkeeper"s contract would be cancelled, effective immediately to allow Nikolov to fulfill his lifelong dream to play in the United States.
Thus, after 22 years of fidelity to Frankfurt, Nikolov left the club as Germany"s most loyal Bundesliga player.
On 19 June 2013, Nikolov signed with the Philadelphia Union of Major League Soccer. He made his first start as a Union player on 30 July 2013 in a friendly against Stoke City playing 45 minutes.
He was waived without appearing in a league match. Nikolov signed with Fort Lauderdale Strikers on February 19, 2014 on a contract for the nine-game Spring season.
Nikolov started and played eight matches in goal for the Strikers, posting two clean sheets.
Since he also possessed German nationality, because of that he couldn"t acquire Macedonian passport and therefore was unable to play in official games under Fédération internationale de football association. His 5 appearances were only in friendlies.