Saints not only have Premier League defences running scared this season, but the bookies too.

The odds makers were trying to have their cake and eat it before the start of the campaign as they were unsure whether the summer of change at St Mary’s would drastically affect the club after their eight placed finish the previous season.

They have quickly had to change their tune as Ronald Koeman’s men keep flying high and with delighted fans backing their team to achieve something remarkable.

With the prospect of losing substantial amounts of money in mind, the bookmakers have quickly had to revise their odds to take Saints seriously.

The Daily Echo always provides the odds for the new campaign in our pre-season supplement and decided now would be a good time to revisit them and see how they have changed. The shift can hardly be more marked.

The biggest headline grabber is in the title winning market, where Saints started the season as 1,500-1 outsiders, but are now in as short as 66-1.

That is in contrast to the likes of Arsenal and Manchester United who have gone from 7-1 and 5-1 respectively to 40-1 and 55-1. Liverpool, to whom Saints lost Adam Lallana, Rickie Lambert and Dejan Lovren in the summer, have gone from 12-1 to a whopping 200-1, while Tottenham, managed by former Saints boss Mauricio Pochettino, below, have moved out from 66-1 to 500-1.

Though most Saints fans would still struggle to believe Saints will end the season as Premier League title winners, there might well be a few who believed Koeman could continue Pochettino’s work and press for the top four.

That prospect is suddenly looking like a possibility.

Saints are fifth favourites – behind Chelsea, Man City, Arsenal and Man United – to bag a spot at 9-4, which is in massively from the pre-season price of 100-1.

Tottenham and Everton, who are perennially on the fringes, are now at 9-1.

Saints started the season at 11-2 for relegation –shorter odds than Sunderland – but they are now 1,000-1. Saints supporters will no doubt take particular delight at the top goalscorer odds, which go some way to revealing how well or otherwise some of those to have left the club recently have done.

Graziano Pelle is in from 80-1 to 33-1, while Rickie Lambert, pictured right, has sailed out from 66-1 to 300-1.

Lambert’s price is the same not only as another former Saint, Adam Lallana, being top Premier League scorer at the end of the season, out from 125-1, but also the same as Jay Rodriguez – who is yet to even play this season after an ACL knee reconstruction earlier in the year.

Pelle, the man who has replaced Lambert as the focal point of the Saints attack, has actually scored more Premier League goals this season (6) than Lambert has had shots (4).

Oddly, given he had only just been appointed into his post at St Mary’s, Koeman started the season at 16-1 sixth favourite to be the first manager to leave his job but is now ranked alongside the likes of Jose Mourinho at 100-1, while Pochettino is fourth favourite at 8-1.