Cristiano Ronaldo 101

Cristiano Ronaldo has been named Professional Footballers’ Association Player of the Year for the second time in succession.

The Manchester United midfielder has enjoyed another outstanding campaign having scored 38 goals in all competitions for the Barclays Premier League champions.

The 23-year-old beat off competition from Fernando Torres, Steven Gerrard, Cesc Fabregas, Emmanuel Adebayor and David James to land the prize.

Arsenal midfielder Fabregas was named Young Player of the Year - an award which Ronaldo also won in 2007 - at a star-studded ceremony at London’s Grosvenor House Hotel tonight.

PFA team of the year (Premier League)

David James (Portsmouth), Bacary Sagna (Arsenal), Rio Ferdinand (Man Utd), Nemanja Vidic (Man Utd), Gael Clichy (Arsenal), Steven Gerrard (Liverpool), Cesc Fabregas (Arsenal), Cristiano Ronaldo (Man Utd), Ashley Young (Aston Villa), Emmanuel Adebayor (Arsenal), Fernando Torres (Liverpool).

[Soccernet]

Ronaldo scored his first hattrick for Manchester United, and led the team to demolish Newcastle 6-0 in Old Trafford. Carlos Tevez scored a double while Rio Ferdinand was on the score sheet as well.

MU dominated the game from the start but the scoreline was surprisingly kept at 0-0. In fact they could have gone a goal behind if Michael Owen’s goal was not wrongly ruled as offside… but then, United had 2 penalty claims (one was obvious foul in the box) denied as well.

The 2nd half was a different story though; Manchester United finally convert their dominance into goals. Ronaldo opened the scoring on 49th minute with a cleverly taken freekick, and scored the other two on 70th minute and 88th minute.

The hattrick takes Ronaldo’s goal tally to 22 for the current season, just one short of last season’s 23-goals.