No kick-off, no problem as Brentford score early AGAIN

After scoring inside the opening minute of the past three matches Brentford were a bit slower on Saturday at home to Wolverhampton Wanderers, scoring after only 75 seconds, but in their defence they did not have the kick-off this time round.

Nathan Collins headed the Bees ahead in the second minute in their first sustained spell of possession.

It came after Brentford had opened the scoring on 22 seconds at Manchester City, after 23 seconds at Tottenham Hotspur, and on 38 seconds at home to West Ham United.

In each of those fixtures, Brentford had kicked off the match, using their plans to get the ball up early into the opponents' half.

On Saturday, it was Wolves who started the match and sent it long from their goalkeeper Sam Johnstone, but that did not stop Brentford, only slowing them down a bit.

"We’ve been practising winning the coin toss all week, and we lost it. That’s why it took us so long [to score]," joked Brentford manager Thomas Frank.

In total, it has taken Brentford only 158 of the opening seconds of their last four matches to score, fewer than three minutes.

Brentford's fast starts

Unfortunately for the Bees, they had been unable to add to their past early goals, losing 2-1 to Man City, 3-1 to Spurs and drawing 1-1 with West Ham.

And they were unable to defend their early lead once more as this time Wolves equalised on 3min 57 seconds through Matheus Cunha, the first time that there has been two goals inside the opening four minutes of a Premier League match since Manchester United v Spurs four years ago.

But Brentford were able to show that they can score outside the opening two minutes of matches when they struck a second time on 20 minutes through a Bryan Mbeumo penalty.

Indeed it was a match full of early goals as Wolves equalised for the second time in the 26th minute, this time through Jorgen Strand Larsen, only for Brentford to regain the lead less than 90 seconds later, Christian Norgaard. They added a fourth through Ethan Pinnock's first-half stoppage-time header. 

BRE

5-3

WOL

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That meant that all six first-half goals came from different players, only the sixth time such an event has happened in the Premier League and the first time in nearly 12 years. 

Matches with six different first-half goalscorers

The match finished 5-3 with second-half goals from Fabio Carvalho and Rayan Ait-Nouri, meaning that there were eight different goalscorers, only the 10th time a Premier League match has featured as many different players registering a goal. 

Matches with 8+ different goalscorers