Premier League stars have shown what they can do but can they keep it up?

Erling Haaland is the only Premier League player to score in his first four away games. No other Premier League player has scored a hat-trick in three consecutive home games – a hat-trick of hat-tricks, if you like.

Haaland is the fastest Premier League player to 15 goals. It has taken him just nine games. If he carries on scoring at the same rate he could have 63 Premier League goals by the end of the season.

Will he carry on scoring at the same rate? The current record in a 38-game season is 32 goals. Haaland seems far above the ordinary. Even for him, though, a total as high as 63 is probably unlikely.

It is always worth asking what a performance would become if it were stretched over a whole season – and whether that is likely.

Haaland scores for Manchester City. They have 23 points after nine games. If they accumulate points at the same rate over the rest of the season they will finish with 97. Is that likely? It does not seem particularly unlikely. More than once in recent seasons City have reached a similar total – 93 last season, 98 four seasons ago and a record 100 five seasons ago.

Arsenal are top of the Premier League. They have 24 points from nine games. If they carry on at the same rate they will finish with 101 points. Is that likely? Probably not. Arsenal look better than they did last season but do they look like the best Premier League team ever?

Leicester are bottom of the Premier League with four points from nine games. If they accrue points at the same rate over the rest of the season they will finish with 17. Is that likely? No. A total so low is extremely unusual and despite their results Leicester do not give the impression of being extraordinarily bad.

In La Liga in the first three rounds of fixtures home teams scored only 40 per cent of all goals. In the five rounds since then they have scored 57 per cent. In the Bundesliga in the first five rounds of fixtures home teams scored 41 per cent of all goals. In the four rounds since then they have scored 66 per cent.

Odds assume that with fans in the stands a team will gain an advantage from playing on their own ground. In the early weeks of this season someone could have formed the opinion that home advantage no longer existed in La Liga or the Bundesliga and there was value for money in backing away teams. They would have been wrong to do so.

For competitions even more than for individual teams, football tends to follow long-term trends around which there can be short-term fluctuations. Those short-term fluctuations are mostly random. The long-term trends are not set in stone. They can also change, but when they do there is usually a good reason we could have spotted at the beginning. There was no obvious reason why home advantage should still exist in England and Italy and elsewhere but not in Spain and Germany.

In the Premier League, Brentford play Brighton on Friday. This is the 33rd season they have played each other in league games, but only the second in the Premier League. There were three seasons in the Championship and 28 at lower levels.

Matthew Benham and Tony Bloom are smart owners with a betting background who seem to have found a way of applying the betting concept of value for money to buying and selling players. Under their ownership Brentford and Brighton have risen through the divisions.

We hear a lot of talk about keeping alive the hope for every club in the lower divisions of being able to rise to the top. Brentford and Brighton have shown that it can be done. But it is not done often. There is not a lot of change in football hierarchies. In England, Spain, Germany and Italy, at least half of the clubs who were in the top division 50 seasons ago are there this season.

What are the prospects this season at either end of the Premier League? After nine games, Arsenal have 24 points and Leicester four. If they carried on at the same rate, Arsenal would finish with 101 and Leicester 17.

In previous 38-game seasons 12 teams had four points after nine games. Eleven of them had more than 17 points after 38 games. The other had 17. Only one team had 24 points after nine games – Kevin Keegan’s fondly-remembered Newcastle of 1995-96. They finished with 78 points.

City give a new twist to some old tales

Football writer Jonathan Wilson made his name with a book called Inverting the Pyramid. It was a history of tactics. The title came from the evolution of formations over more than a century from 2-3-5 to 5-3-2.

If you have watched Manchester City in this or recent seasons you will have seen through different phases of play a re-inversion of the pyramid.

Back in 1967-68, City were the last team to become champions of England playing predominantly WM. It was a 3-2-2-3 formation used in England from the middle 1920s. If you marked the positions on a piece of paper and joined the dots you could get the letters W and M.

Watch City today as they play out from defence. There are three at the back with two in front of them – and ahead of those, ready for the ball to be played upfield, two more then another three. In this phase of play there are essentially three backs, two half-backs, two inside-forwards and three forwards. It is WM.

And watch City when the ball reaches the attacking third. Now there are two at the back with three in front of those and five spread across the pitch further forward. In this phase of play there are two backs, three half-backs and five forwards. It is 2-3-5, a formation used in England before WM, perhaps from as early as the 1870s. Pep Guardiola’s City, the most modern of teams, have re-imagined some very old combinations.

Not got a Paddy Power account? Sign up and get up to £50 in free sports bets

Place a single £10 Sportsbook bet and get money back as a free bet if it loses. There are x5 Free Bets available. Max refund per qualifying bet is £10. Only deposits made via Credit/Debit Card will be eligible for the promotion. Paddy's Rewards Club: Get a £10 free bet when you place 5x bets of £10+. T&Cs apply 18+ begambleaware.org

MORE FREE BETS

Today's top sports betting stories

Follow us on Twitter @racingpostsport