FOOTBALL: THE FORM OF CLUBS UP TO NOW

Let's start with Arsenal since they are probably the most consistent and best performing club of the season thus far if you compare all 3 major leagues in England, Spain and Italy. Their latest win in the Carling Cup match away to Sheffield United just now is a further evidence that Wenger's youth policy is starting to pay off and is still grooming the next new generation for the current first squad starting eleven. Apart from the expected great performance by Fabregas, Adebayor is stepping up to be the biggest surprise so far. Arsenal are not missing Henry at all. The only pity is VanPersie is out injured after similar form. Although his policy does have its own critics by Platini and Blatter, I guess they just want to take the opportunity to say something now that Arsenal is on form. Jealousy perhaps?

Among the many complaints, I do see some point in the only English player in Arsenal to be the major point to criticize for destroying English players' chances to be good footballers. Well, at least there should be some law in place to have at least 3 or half the starting 11 to be of the nationality of the league they are playing in. Many said the current England national team's ability is badly damaged because of how the league is not promoting younger generations of English players. I cannot agree absolutely that it is the main reason for such an effect but I do believe it does contribute. Then again, the Premier League is so commercialized now and nothing is more prioritized than earning money.

Blatter
Platini

Whatever it is, after a 1-1 draw against struggling Liverpool the other day at Anfield, they will face Manchester United at home this weekend. It will be the match to watch for the weekend! Manchester United are doing fine, chasing the invincible Arsenal closely at the top. Chelsea are slowly regaining back their form after a shocking Mourinho exit. A few hiccups after the Drogba interview of wanting to leave, they finally settled with Grant having Lampard and Drogba on fire. Even Shevchenko is scoring again last night during the Carling Cup match against Leicester. Time will tell if they will gain back to their good form again.

The other big issue of the current season is the sacking of managers at this point of time. Bolton, Tottenham, Sevilla and Valencia all fell victims to it. All of them are more or less suffering without managers. Tottenham got Ramos from Sevilla and started with a win against Blackpool in the Carling Cup just now.

Real Madrid are now in the rotation system under Schuster but many players are still not getting much chances under him as I feared early in the season. People like Saviola, Baptista and Soldado. The defence is having a lot of injury problems and Robben is again as always injury-proned. In fact, many of the new players bought are injured. The just notched a huge win against the managerless Valencia who will have Koeman as new coach soon. They will face another managerless club, Sevilla this weekend. Their performance thus far, apart from Sergio Ramos and Raul, has been extremely inconsistent. They need to adapt to the rotation system under Schuster fast in preparation of facing bigger teams like Barcelona.

Barcelona are now worshipping Messi, not Ronaldinho anymore as he spends more time Samba partying. Messi is definitely the only person outside Arsenal who is on form. Barcelona do have their own injury worries in Deco and Eto'o but they are still winning. Henry is adapting and will need some time to get back to his best.

AC Milan. How do you rate them with their performance so far? Can we discard them as a major force to be reckoned with like last season? The pattern seems similar but last season, they rose up to become the Champions League winner after a bad start. They just won against Sampdoria with a 0-5 victory. They have the likes of Montella and the on-loaned no.99 bad boy Antonio Cassano. Many commented that Milan have an extremely old squad and the forwards are not getting enough action to attack. We will just have to see as last season proves that nothing is over until it is over.

Inter Milan. They are doing well, more reliable and consistent now. Figo is still playing and I am rooting for him 100%. I do miss him in Real Madrid after he was forced out because of the commercialization of David Beckham. Adriano is playing again, which is good for Inter as they have more options apart from Cruz and Ibrahimovic. I believe they should be able to do well again this season if they keep up their performance.

Roma are also doing quite good following Inter at the top of the table. I will be taking a close look at them as Real Madrid's Cicinho had been sold to them and Giuly as well from Barcelona. I'm a fan of Cicinho and am extremely frustrated he was forced out as well. As for Juventus, they came back to the Serie A and sit in third now at the top of the table. Let's see how well they will be doing now that they are back.