(Disclaimer: A zealous and passionate account from the perspective of a diehard fan)

This post is dedicated to the best soccer player in the world right now on current form. Born Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro in Madeira, Portugal, on 5th February 1985, the player has just about exhausted all superlatives. Mesmeric, brilliant, dazzling, lustrous, scintillating, magnificent, virtuoso, majestic, effulgent, sensational, maestro, sublime, immaculate. Maybe I’m going over the top here, but he is THAT GOOD. I’ll leave it for you to judge if you have been following soccer news.

A little known teenager when he first signed for Manchester United, World Cup 2006 saw his meteoric rise into a world class footballer. He has not looked back ever since. I have no words to describe his goalscoring exploits as a winger, which no doubt put many a world class strikers to shame. 23 goals for club in the 06/07 season appears to be out of this world coming from a midfielder playing in arguably the toughest league in the world, and so he swept 14 individual honours amidst firing Manchester United to the premiership trophy. But… who would have thought… that was just icing on the cake for what was to follow.

Few people would have imagined at the end of last season, that the lad Ronaldo will go on to better that kind of performance in a sensational year. Fast forward 8 months, he left the world gaping in awe of his abilities again. Pace, power, technique, he has everything. One begins to wonder how the governing body deemed Kaka to be winner of the World Footballer Award in 2007. Ronaldo clearly intends to show how wrong of a move that was. With another 3.5 months of the season yet to come, he has already added 22 goals to his name for 07/08. That is just unbelievable, a feat achieved when he collected his first hat-trick for Manchester United in the clinical demolition of Newcastle on 12th January 2008.

Scarily though, at just 22 years old, Cristiano Ronaldo do not seem to be the finished article yet, a fact that opposing managers must be bemoaning. Polishing his undoubted talents year by year, his unbounded potential for footballing will surely thrust him into the pinnacle of football, if he already isn’t there.

All right, after the initial stretch of EPL, let us now take a look at some (shallow) review from me.

On general form, Derby is bottom as expected. But look who else is in relegation zone – Bolton and Tottenham! I had expected Bolton to start struggling after Big Sam left the club, but such immediate disaster wasn’t exactly expected. But if such scenario is anticipated, that of Tottenham dwelling here shouldn’t have been. With a squad that slowly amass a semblance of some stars, Tottenham had been in the hunt to push into the elites of EPL for the past 2 seasons. Come this season, they have only now gathered 3 points against Derby, and draws with Bolton and Fulham, who inevitably, lies just 1 position above Tottenham.

No surprises there, Fulham and Wigan are amongst teams I believe would perform with a degree of struggle. What surprised me is the meteoric rise of Man City and Newcastle. In Man City, it really came as a shock that they took almost zero time to gel as a team. In Newcastle, the defence appears to have been somewhat sorted, and they could put them in a much stronger position to challenge.

Now about the Big 4. Yes the world is shocked by the departure of Jose Mourinho from Chelsea. Now it appears the team faces an uphill battle to challenge for the title the longer their star players are out with injuries. Normally you would expect a Chelsea team to have more than enough cover, but at this point of time, Avram Grant is likely to fail in motivating the “fringe” players.

Now in Liverpool’s case, it is all the same with tinkerman. Week in week out, Liverpool produces performances of supremely varied quality. And this could hurt in their hunt for a first title in god knows how many years. On the other hand, Arsenal had been firing on all cylinders despite losing their supposed talisman to secure top position. Perhaps it was too early for pundits to write them off just a couple months ago.

Finally on Man Utd, a shaky start to the season was soon banished on the back of consecutive clean sheets and grinding out wins while in shaky form. This is such an important attribute to have, the resilience to get maximum points when you are playing badly. Because we all know the quality of Man Utd when they start to find some semblance of rhythm. Its still early days yet and the table could change drastically. But before I close off, I might as well alert you to some players to scrutinize (not like you didn’t already know who!)

Arsenal – Francesc Fabregas, Emmanuel Adebayor
Chelsea – Michael Essien
Man City – Kasper Schmeichel, Micah Richards, Martin Petrov
Man Utd – Patrice Evra
Middlesbrough – Stewart Downing
Sunderland – Craig Gordon
Tottenham – Gareth Bale

Something to highlight to EPL viewers over here. I wonder wad are your opinions of Louis Saha, especially Man Utd fans. This curiosity stems from the fact that many forum-ers dismiss him as a peripheral figure in the squad. Perhaps he did spend too much a time in the physio room, especially in his early tenure as a Man Utd player. On the other side of the camp, there are people who hail him as a great player who fit the mold of the out-&-out striker at Man Utd perfectly. Saha offers pace, power and penetration with his strength and movement. This actually opens up alot of spaces for the creative players. Thus, Saha’s contribution is much more than what you can visualise from the goals and assists chart. Speaking of which, averaging about a goal every 3 game ain’t bad for a striker mind you.

While I’m at the subject of soccer, I might as well offer my opinions on certain players who perform beyond my expectations. First is Fabregas. The young Arsenal player began the season in sparkling form and has a very respectable amount of goals and assists to his name already. Elsewhere, Utaka of Portsmouth and prodigy keeper Kasper Schmeichel must have raised some eyebrows too.

Ok, if you have not figured out which team I support in the EPL, you are a bit slow, hah. Anyway, they had only just registered the first win of the season proper, which was a tad disappointing, given the expectations brewed over the summer. With the pathetic start to the campaign, coupled by misfortunes to Rooney and Ronaldo, the team looked in pretty bad form. Even though they had been dominating games, draws and losses occurred time after time… Nani spared their blushes yesterday with a superbly taken goal. I still couldn’t bear to look at the EPL table… Could it be the curse of the Community Shield?

All right, lets continue where I left off. 10 more teams to go.

Manchester City – I seem to think Sven-Goran Eriksson plays FM (Football Manager) when he made those purchases. Despite the new array of names to pick from, I still plump for Micah Richards. The explosive defender showed signs of developing into a top player and this could very well be his season.

Manchester United – A truly remarkable season last year thanks in no small part to Cristiano Ronaldo, but Wayne Rooney is just not about to give up yet. Even with the additional competition from Carlos Tevez, Rooney shows just how much desire he has to be top-dog alongside his illustrious compatriots with sparkling performances in pre-season.

Middlesbrough – New acquisition Sanli Tuncay can play on either wings or as a striker. He has a good goalscoring record and assists as well before his move to Middlesbrough. It will be intriguing to see how well and fast he can adapt to the EPL as fans will be expecting much from him.

Newcastle United – Newcastle had moved swiftly to bring in defensive reinforcements, but the jury is still out on how effective as a unit they can function. Steven Taylor suddenly finds himself with more competition for places, and must move up a gear to show just why he was so highly rated as a youth.

Portsmouth – They have bought sensibly without splashing on any big names. David James will be the man to look out for after impressing between the sticks the previous season. James seems to be carrying his form into the new season with an impressive performance against Liverpool in the Asian Cup Tournament earlier in pre-season.

Reading – It is usually difficult for a team who had done exceeding well in their first season back into the top flight to repeat that performance. Nicky Shorey will once again be important with his amazing amount of assists coming from the left-back position. With interests from other clubs, it is unknown how long Shorey could stay with Reading.

Sunderland – All eyes will be on Craig Gordon for what he could achieve. His move could potentially set a new British record of the highest transfer fee for a goalkeeper. History are against Sunderland in the EPL in recent years, so Gordon must be on top of his game to keep opposition goals to a minimal.

Tottenham Hotspur – Dimitar Berbatov grabbed all the headlines last season, and rightly so. However, Darren Bent will be eager to prove his worth after a big money transfer. With poor service from midfield and the full burden to score goals at Charlton, Bent still duly delivered, but now he must fight for his place alongside bigger names.

West Ham United – The summer had been dominated by the controversial transfer of Carlos Tevez, but another striker, Dean Ashton, will now have to keep West Ham in the hunt. Ashton consistently scored goals at every tier of English football, and a lengthy lay-off will be the driving force he needs to explode onto the scene again.

Wigan Athletic – Wigan appears to be unable to keep hold of their best players. A difficult season looms and it will be a big ask of Chris Kirkland to keep them in the top flight. Only time will tell if Wigan can continue living on borrowed time, but I sense the impending return to Championship football.

Below is just my blind guesses on the final standings. My personal opinions, which will no doubt not come true though.
1 Man Utd, 2 Chelsea, 3 Arsenal, 4 Liverpool, 5 Tottenham
6 Everton, 7 Blackburn, 8 Portsmouth, 9 Newcastle, 10 Man City
11 Middlesbrough, 12 West Ham, 13 Aston Villa, 14 Bolton, 15 Reading
16 Sunderland, 17 Fulham, 18 Birmingham, 19 Wigan, 20 Derby