Eriol is a transfer student from England who enrolled in Tomoeda Elementary in the midle of the school year. He was introduced to the class and noticed Sakura right away. It didn't help matters when Syaoran noticed him noticing Sakura and when Eriol stopped by and said hello to her. Eriol took Meiling's old desk behind Tomoyo and beside Syaoran.
Eriol is very popular and athletic like Syaoran but he's nicer to everyone around him. He's very polite ad kind towards sakura, and this makes Syaoran see red because now Syaoran likes Sakura.
Eriol and Takashi also share their own little friendship as well, both have something in common. They're both experts at lying. Takashi told his first lie as a greeting for Eriol and Chiharu was about to shut him up when Eriol picked up the lie and they continued lying back and forth while everyone else stared. But Eriol does it for fun when Takashi starts, he continues on.
Eriol and Tomoyo also have something in common too, they both look after Sakura with gentle eyes. But of course, there's more to him than meets the eye. Eriol is half of the reincarnation of Clow Read. The other half of Clow Read's reincarnation is surprisingly Kinomoto Fujitaka. However, Fujitaka is unaware of this phenomena and has no magical powers as far as I know. Eriol does possess remnants of Clow Read's powers and memories from Clow Read's life before he died. That is how he was able to create the two new Guardians, Ruby Moon and Spinel Sun. When referring to Clow Read in the past, he calls him "master." But this doesn't mean Eriol IS Clow Read. Eriol is still a little boy, living his own life as well as dealing with Clow's.
He is the mastermind of of all the strange events in the Sakura Card arc storyline. The reason he sends magical monsters and disturbance against Sakura is for Sakura to fight and strengthen her own magic by transforming all the Clow Cards into Sakura Cards. He would not hurt Sakura necessarily but gives her an incentive to succeed. Eriol cares for Sakura like a daughter since she is the daughter of his other half.
In the end, during the last battle, Eriol puts everyone in Tokyo into a magical sleep and challenged Sakura for the last time. Sakura proved strong enough, transforming all the Clow Cards into Sakura Cards and became the true Clow Mistress. After that, Eriol goes back to England with Nakuru, Spinel Sun, and Mitsuki Kaho. He has an appearance during Cardcaptor Sakura Movie 2: Enchanted Cards.