Having scored nine times in his initial seven league matches, Manchester City striker Erling Haaland has started the season in spectacular form.
Although this isn't his best start to a season - he scored 11 goals in his opening seven appearances in two seasons ago and 10 last season - it nonetheless positions him three strikes clear in the initial race for this season's Premier League Golden Boot.
The fact that not one of his nine strikes have been spot-kicks makes it all the more impressive.
Certainly, injury could definitively intervene in the destination of the Golden Boot, but there are two key factors why Haaland is such a clear frontrunner for the prize so early in the season.
To begin with, the number of goals he has thus far netted - and, just as importantly, the number and quality of scoring opportunities he's creating.
And second, the modest opening his usual rivals for the honor have made.
A footballer's xG statistic (xG) indicates how many goals a Premier League player has typically netted from the quantity and caliber of chances he has had.
This isn't a number randomly picked by statistics boffins, but by English top-flight records.
And if we look at players' xG in the English top division so far this season from open play, the Norwegian striker is getting so many more quality chances to convert than any other player.
Actually, even if Haaland were no better at converting opportunities than any other player in the division, he would nevertheless have converted significantly more goals as the remainder of the league.
That is demonstrated by examining the quantity and caliber of opportunities that players have had in the Premier League so far.
Haaland has attempted 29 efforts so far this term, twelve additional compared to every other footballer.
That is actually not that remarkable for him - he had in fact attempted more non-spot-kick efforts at this stage in the most recent two terms (30 in last season and 34 in the 2024-25 campaign).
What's particularly remarkable even by his standards is the standard of scoring situations he has had this campaign. His efforts have had an chance quality metric of 0.27 per attempt.
What that figure means is that footballers have traditionally scored the attempts he's taken at a 27% success ratio.
Among footballers attempting at ten or more efforts, only Stamford Bridge player Enzo Fernandez has had more straightforward opportunities to convert per attempt - because of a couple of tap-ins against West Ham and Brighton.
City striker's xG statistic of 0.27 is much higher than the 0.17 xG per shot he had at the start of last season.
In short, the opportunities he has had in 2025-26 have been significantly more straightforward to score from in a restructured Manchester City side than those at the opening of last term.
Starting a season so impressively is, as mentioned above, not unusual for Haaland. After seven games last campaign he had registered ten strikes - four more than anyone else and half-dozen more than Mohamed Salah.
Yet it was the Liverpool forward who secured the scoring title with twenty-nine strikes, a touchdown more than the Manchester City striker.
In the new campaign, while Haaland has opened with incredible momentum, Salah has registered half as many goals and had half the scoring situations (xG) than at this juncture last term.
In fact this has been the least productive beginning to a English top-flight campaign the Egypt forward has made.
It is not just Salah who has begun modestly either. When examining at the top 11 scorers in the Premier League last term, Haaland has registered an equal amount goals as the remaining ten footballers combined so far.
Whether due to fitness issues - multiple prominent forwards - protracted transfer stories in Alexander Isak's case or just due to the fact that their clubs have faced difficulties (Bryan Mbeumo, Chris Wood, Ollie Watkins and Matheus Cunha), Haaland's probable competitors in the battle for the scoring title have not fired so far.
Even as Haaland seems the obvious frontrunner for the Premier League scoring title, what about the Continental scoring award that is presented to the attacker netting the highest number in Europe's premier competitions?
That contest is far more competitive at this early stage because two world-class strikers have likewise begun in great form, with 11 and nine goals each.
The circumstance Haaland has netted on numerous occasions and has the greatest expected goals of the three players despite not attempting any from the penalty spot makes him the frontrunner.
Yet given that the English and French stars are two of the best converters in European soccer in terms of exceeding their expected goals, the competition remains open.
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