Are Chelsa back at their best?

Now that two weeks of Premiership action has gone past, I suppose its safe to say that no team, with the exception of Tottenham, has had a better start than Chelsea. Written off by the pundits in pre-season, the Blues under Carlo Ancelotti seem reborn. With Didier Drogba and Nico Anelka back to their best and aided by an in-form Frank Lampard, Chelsea have so far looked the strongest of the Big Four (and are the only one not to have lost a game yet).

What's perhaps most interesting is that Chelsea's fringe players like Ashley Cole and Florent Malouda (and to a certain extent, Deco) are playing some of their best football in recent memory. Without a doubt, the Italian's impact on the club has been nothing short of amazing. And to top it all off, the former Milan boss has been able to excel where Jose Mourinho, Avram Grant, Luiz Scolari and Guus Hiddink failed; as in getting Michael Ballack to do the things he used to do with Bayern Munich at Chelsea.

But despite the perfect start to the season, I believe its still too early to say if Ancelotti's Chelsea will bring the Premiership crown back to Stamford Bridge. After all, the Blues did pretty well under Scolari in the beginning.

As for the other so-called Big Four, let's just say their flaws have been revealed a bit too early on in the season. In Man Utd's case, one could argue that the Devils have generally been slow starters. But the league is a little different this year with the likes of Tottenham, Man City and Aston Villa all itching to break into the top four.

United have at times looked like their best and at times looked like a side sorely missing the creative genius of Cristiano Ronaldo. Against the Gunners last weekend, the Devils were outplayed and out thought at times but their determination held up and it took a contentious penalty and some help from Abou Diaby's misguided head to give Utd the full three points.

As for the Gunners, after a sterling start to the season, Arsene Wenger's boys were once again defeated due to what I believe is a lack of mental strength and experience whenever the going gets tough. Once the score was evened out at 1-1, United threw everything against the Gunners who then subsequently buckled under pressure and began making juvenile mistakes (no pun intended). The Prof can say what he wants but his boys were certainly deserving of those yellow cards.

And there's Liverpool. For a team that believes it was the best in the league last season, the Reds look like a side that's about to implode on the pitch. I've already spoken about the wonders that is Lucas and Voronin before so I won't waste anymore kilobytes on the two. But the fact is, Liverpool are sorely missing the services of Xabi Alonso. Case in point: the Reds most recent fixture against Bolton where the Reds had to slog it out to gather all three points. And victory only seemed certain once Bolton were reduced to 10 men. One wonders if Liverpool would have gone home with three points of Bolton had all 11 players on the pitch throughout the match.

The bigger question of course is whether any of the other big four would have had to huff and puff to beat a side like Bolton.