Hi, my name is Marty and I am a first-year student here at Fanshawe in Broadcast Journalism. This will be my weekly column on professional soccer. Feel free to drop me an e-mail if you want me to write about a certain topic.

In the first month of any season, it's hard to find any consistency. Nothing can really seem for sure. However, after several dominant performances thus far, Manchester City and Manchester United are easy bets to finish top of the table this season.

With Wayne Rooney back in his 40-goal-a-season form, a Manchester United team would be very hard to overlook as possible English and European Champions. The defending champions have exploded out of the gate for their new campaign and look unstoppable. As of their match against Bolton, the Reds have scored an astonishing 18 goals and only three goals against. Some of the standouts include Ashley Young, who has provided incredible service from the midfield, with four assists and has also got in the goal action with two against Arsenal; Nemanja Vidic in his usual form has been shutting down attacks by some of the finest strikers around; and the aforementioned Rooney, who has scored back-to-back hat-tricks and accounts for eight of ManU's record-breaking 18 goals.

However, on the blue side of Manchester, much of the same praise is being earned by the Citizens. Manchester City has also had a fantastic start to the season. Not only have City scored at least three goals in their first four games, they have only surrendered three goals in the four games they played this season. Manchester City can attribute that to their back three, if you will, of two centre backs and their goalkeeper. Vincent Kompany, Joleon Lescott and Joe Hart have played the entire 360 minutes City have played in the league this season and have been stunning. Roberto Manchini's decision to keep Hart around over Shay Given has turned out to be a fantastic squad choice.

What will the season have in store for both of these sides? It's hard to say. City, completely new to playing competitive European nights, may have trouble balancing a Group A that includes Napoli, Villarreal and Bayern Munich with a successful domestic campaign. I'm not saying that they don't have the depth, they are just untested.

United still rely heavily on the successes of Wayne Rooney and the young guns that Sir Alex Fergusson has placed in the spotlight. With an eventual deep European run, will tired legs catch up with many of the lynchpins at United like Vidic and Rooney?

Other stories: Stoke is once again surprising many with scrappy wins and brutal ties. Watch out for them to place top half. Local boys Toronto FC have also been doing much of the same, a team that is finally starting to click; Toronto grabbed its first away win of the season against Columbus on September 10. Look for more wins in the coming weeks. Series A started that same day and Roma quickly fell to Calgari 2 to 1. An interesting storyline going forward in the capital: who stays, who goes?