We're eight games into the Premier League season. Eight games -- such a classic number. Everyone is always talking about who's scored the most goals over the last eight games, who has the most points over the most recent eight-game stretch and what have you. Every good soccer fan knows how sacred the eight-match set is.
Turn that bad boy on its side, however, and you'll see infinity. Eight is the atomic number for oxygen -- can't live without it. Everything you need to know about soccer exists within every eight-game sample.
Or not. Obviously not. And yet, since we've only seen eight games so far this season, we treat these eight games in a way that we would never treat any other eight-game stretch. And by that I mean: We simply just look at them and begin to make conclusions about the current state of teams and try to project out their futures.
So, before play begins this weekend and we move beyond the realm of the infinite and into the world of nine matches played, let's take a look at how useful these eight games have been in the past, and then see if we can't add in more matches to get a more complete picture of the state of the Premier League.