Real Betis v Villarreal: Could this be the new La Liga fourth-place fight?

Over the past three seasons, La Liga's top four have been somewhat predictable.

Real Madrid, Barcelona and Atletico Madrid make up the top three, while Sevilla claim fourth place and the final Champions League spot.

While that could still be the case in 2022-23, a shaky start for Julen Lopetegui's men saw them claim just one point in their first four games as they sit in 17th place.

As you might expect, Madrid and Barca set the tone early in the race in Spain, although two other teams who got off to promising starts meet at the Estadio Benito Villamarin on Sunday.

Ahead of Real Betis v Villarreal, Stats Perform examined whether city rivals Sevilla and the Yellow Submarine can fight for a place in this season's top four.

Betis have shown steady progress in recent seasons, having finished 15th in 2019-20. Then Manuel Pellegrini arrived, seeing them climb to sixth place the following year, and fifth last season, in addition to winning the Copa del Rey.

Pellegrini's impact has been impressive at Los Verdiblancos, taking them from flirting with relegation to battling for European places and winning a trophy, and they've also made a promising start to this campaign .

Winnings against Elche, Mallorca and Osasuna gave them nine points from nine, before a narrow away loss to domestic and European champions Real Madrid.

They also got off to a winning start to their Europa League campaign on Thursday, winning 2-0 at HJK.

Betis haven't finished ahead of rivals Sevilla since 2017-18, but with the platform they've given themselves in the first few weeks of this season, maybe it's time for their fans to dream again.

As for Villarreal, they made an even more impressive start, winning three and drawing in their first four league games.

Unai Emery's men are yet to concede a goal in La Liga, with clear wins over Real Valladolid, Atletico and Elche accompanied by a 0-0 draw at Getafe.

In fact, Villarreal are the fourth team to keep a clean sheet in each of their first four games of a La Liga season in the 21st century, after Celta Vigo in 2001-02, Barcelona in 2014-15 and the Real Madrid in 2015. -16.

Like Betis, Villarreal also got off to a good start in Europe, although strangely they were a bit more enthusiastic than in the league, beating Hajduk Split 6-2 on aggregate to qualify for the Europa Conference League, before edging out a thriller 4-3 at home to Lech Poznan on Thursday in their first group stage match.

The Castellon club had a similar trajectory to Betis, finishing 14th in LaLiga in 2018-19, before moving up to fifth (2019-20), seventh (2020-21) and seventh (2021-22).

Villarreal actually had the third-best goal difference in the league last season behind Madrid and Barca (+26), but finished 12 points and four places behind Atletico in third despite a best GD of four.

Under Emery's guidance, they even added an impressive European campaign to their CV last season, beating Bayern Munich to reach the Champions League semi-finals, where they scared Liverpool in the game back before losing 5-2 on aggregate.

This suggests that the components are all there for an effective and dangerous team, they just need to spread their goals across matches and avoid the kind of collapse at key moments that saw them take control of the game. draw against Liverpool in the second half at El Madrigal in May.

Emery will have to overcome a barrier, however, to ensure success at home and abroad.

His record of four Europa League wins with Sevilla (three) and Villarreal is remarkable, but in every year he has lifted the trophy his sides have never finished above fifth in the league, where his Arsenal team also finished in the Premier League when they were beaten by Chelsea in the 2018-19 Europa League final.

His Sunday counterpart, Pellegrini, has had less success in European competition, but has a Premier League title to his name since his move to Manchester City, as well as Ecuadorian and Argentine league titles much more early in his career.

Borja Iglesias' goals will be important, especially with Juanmi injured, the former having already scored four out of four games, while keeping Nabil Fekir in the transfer window will also look like a new signing. There is also, of course, the evergreen experience, in more ways than one, Joaquin at 41.

Villarreal can look to build their success on the solid defense of Raul Albiol and Pau Torres, while Dani Parejo continues to lead things in midfield, and similarly to Fekir for Betis, keeping Samuel Chukwueze should to be a big boost, especially after his superb goal against Lech Poznan.

Of course, Sunday's clash is only the fifth game of the season, and there's still plenty of time...