Hull City vs Aston Villa: third in the table plays 19th

Hull City are third in the Premier League. Aston Villa are nineteenth. Hull came up last season; Villa have been in the top flight for a decade. On Saturday evening at the MKM Stadium the two of them meet, and the table is not lying about either.

Hull have won both of their matches and conceded nothing. Villa have lost both and scored nothing. It is the widest gap in form of any fixture this weekend, and it is between the two clubs you would have picked in reverse order in August.

Hull have won twice without the ball

The opening weekend produced the result of the round: Hull 2-0 Manchester United, at the MKM, against a side that then went out and scored five the following week.

Last Saturday they went to Coventry and won 1-0 with 31.3% of the possession and six shots. Coventry had 68.7% and eleven. Liam Millar settled it on eighty-two minutes with a right-footed strike from outside the box, assisted by Mohamed Belloumi.

Six points, three goals scored, none conceded. Hull have played two matches in which they had less of the ball than their opponent and won both. That is a coherent way for a promoted side to survive, and for six weeks or so it tends to work very well, because it takes the rest of the division a while to work out that you are perfectly happy without possession.

Villa have not had a shot on target since the first weekend

Villa were beaten 4-0 at Brighton on the opening weekend. Last Monday they lost 1-0 at home to Arsenal, and the numbers from that match are the ones that should concern them.

Villa had seven shots and none on target. Arsenal had seven shots and two on target, one of which was Bukayo Saka finishing from very close range on fifty-nine minutes after a Riccardo Calafiori assist. Arsenal had 60.8% of the ball and won without ever needing to do very much.

So Villa have played 180 minutes, conceded five, scored none, and in their most recent match did not force a save. That is a goal difference of minus five and a place in the bottom two, level on nothing with Tottenham and Crystal Palace.

Why the fixture is awkward for Hull too

The temptation is to treat this as a straightforward home win. It probably is not, and the reason is the same thing that has made Hull effective: they do not want the ball.

Against Manchester United and against Coventry that suited them, because both of those sides wanted to take it. Villa, on current evidence, do not want it either — they had 39.2% at home against Arsenal. A match between two sides who would both rather counter-attack is the one type of afternoon in which Hull’s approach has not yet been tested.

There is also the matter of Villa being desperate, which is a real factor in early September. A club that has lost twice, scored nothing and sits nineteenth will arrive at the MKM playing with an urgency neither of Hull’s previous opponents brought.

Two clean sheets against five conceded

Hull have not conceded a goal this season. Only Arsenal can say the same. Villa have conceded five and scored none, and are one of three clubs on minus five.

The gap between those two records across only two matches each is the widest in the division, and it is worth noting that Hull’s clean sheets came against Manchester United and Coventry — one side that then scored five, and one that has not scored at all. So the defensive record has been tested at least once against real attacking quality, and it held.

What it would mean either way

A Hull win takes them to nine points from three matches, which for a promoted club is a start that changes the entire complexion of a season — not because it guarantees anything, but because it buys the months of bad form that always come later.

A Villa win is worth more still in relative terms: it lifts them out of the bottom three, gets them their first goal of the campaign, and stops the story becoming a story. Three matches without a goal is a headline; two is a slow start.

The wider point is that this table will not look like this in six weeks. Promoted clubs above established ones in early September is the most routine thing in English football, and it is also, every couple of seasons, the beginning of something that lasts. Nobody can tell which this is yet, including the two clubs involved.

The Premier League simulator on this site plays the remaining thirty-five rounds from exactly where the table stands this morning, if you want an answer sooner than May.