The constantly changeable nature of results this season in the Premier League

Nuno left Wolves and became manager of Tottenham before the season started. Tottenham won and Wolves lost their first three Premier League games. Since then one of those teams has recorded five wins, one draw and two defeats. The other has recorded two wins, one draw and five defeats. Exactly the opposite again. Which was which?

Logic suggests that the team with the good recent results would be Tottenham. But what has logic got to do with football? Precious little. It was Wolves.

Tottenham gained nine points more than Wolves from their first three games. Wolves gained nine points more than Tottenham from their next eight games. Now both have the same number of points. How quickly things can change. Nuno is no longer manager of Tottenham.

One thing we never seem to learn from experience, it seems to me, is that there is a limit to what we can learn from experience.

Every weekend some teams are praised and others are condemned. To me, the praise nearly always seems over the top and the condemnation nearly always seems over the top. "People get too carried away when you win and too carried away when you lose," said Tony Pulis when he was manager of Middlesbrough.

A team who were praised last time out might be condemned next time out, and a team who were condemned last time out might be praised next time out.

Historians say we should study the past to learn about the future. What we should learn from the past, I feel, is that it can be different from the future.

Looking through the results of Premier League teams this season I see that many could be split into two and the second part would be a lot different from the first.

Brighton won four of their first five games but none of the next six, though many of those were drawn. Burnley lost four of their first five games but only one of the next six, and that was away to Manchester City.

Southampton did not win any of their first seven games then did not lose any of the next four. Arsenal did not win any of their first three games then did not lose any of the next eight.

When a team’s results go from bad to good, everyone says the manager turned things round. Did he? How did he turn things round? The manager often could not tell you. He would say he worked in the same way throughout and that first of all the team were losing and then they started winning.

Explaining accurately why results change, or when they will change, is all but impossible. Just accept that they can change.

Sterling Magee was a blues singer and guitarist. He said: “For us to try to figure out tomorrow is a waste of efforts. Let it flow, go with the flow, and it’ll work out. It can rain today, it can snow tomorrow, something like the weather. Today you can be broke, tomorrow you can be rich, vice versa.” He knew because he had been up and he had been down, more than once.

War and Peace is the best attempt I have read to explain why things happen. Leo Tolstoy’s answer was that most of the time we will never know.

The background to War and Peace is violence between Russia and France in the early 1800s. The Battle of Borodino, fought in 1812, was the first the French leader Napoleon did not win. How was Borodino different from all the earlier battles Napoleon did win? Tolstoy said nothing was different apart from the outcome.

Napoleon gave the same orders, which ranged from incomprehensible to impossible. His generals ignored his orders, as they always did, and issued their own. Their orders were also nonsensical. The troops did not get them, could not follow them or did not follow them.

Tolstoy wrote of Napoleon: "His troops were the same, his generals the same, his preparations the same, his proclamations the same… He himself was still the same: he knew that and knew that he was now even more experienced and skilful than before. Even the enemy was the same as at Austerlitz and Friedland – yet the terrible stroke of his arm had supernaturally become impotent.

"All the old methods that had been unfailingly crowned with success – all these methods had already been employed, yet not only was there no victory, but from all sides came the same news of generals killed and wounded, of reinforcements needed, of the impossibility of driving back the Russians."

Let us return to something that can be nice: football.

Brentford in the Premier League this season lost only one of their first seven games but then lost all of the next four. Everton did not lose any of their first four games but then lost four of the next seven. Manchester United started with four wins and one draw. Since then they have registered four defeats, one draw and one win. Almost the reverse.

As the jazz singer and pianist Fats Waller said: “One never knows, do one?”

Not got a William Hill account? Sign up and bet £10 to get £30 in free bets

Open a new account using Promo code H30 only, Min £10 stake, min odds 1/2, free bets paid as 2 x £15, free bets credited after settlement of first qualifying bet, free bets will expire 30 days after the qualifying bet is placed, payment method/player/country restrictions apply. T&Cs apply 18+ begambleaware.org

CLAIM OFFER HERE

MORE FREE BETS

Today's top sports betting stories

Follow us on Twitter @racingpostsport