Off the back of scoring a treble against Ipswich Town on matchday two, Haaland took his tally to seven goals for 2024-2025 at London Stadium.

The Norwegian produced a composed one-on-one finish for the opener before arrowing a powerful strike home for his second on the half-hour mark, after a Ruben Dias own goal had briefly dragged West Ham level.

Mohammed Kudus went close to a second West Ham equaliser after the interval, but Haaland wrapped up the points with another breakaway finish with seven minutes to play.

The victory keeps City top of the early-season standings with nine points from nine available, while West Ham is 14th with three points from three games under Julen Lopetegui.

Haaland has earned a reputation as a fast starter since arriving in the Premier League two years ago, but never before has he kicked off a campaign in such ruthless fashion.

The City star had three goals at this stage of the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 seasons. In 2024-2025, he has seven goals from his first three matches.

Throughout the top four tiers of English football, he is also the first player to score a hat-trick in two of a team's first three league games in a season since Paul Jewell for Bradford City in 1994-1995.

Haaland now has eight Premier League hat-tricks for City, and only three players have helped themselves to the match ball on more occasions in the competition's history – Sergio Aguero (12), Alan Shearer (11) and Robbie Fowler (nine).

“He is one of the best players in the world, that's why he plays for Manchester City,” Lopetegui said after the defeat for his side.

“You have to compete with these kind of players. City has the power and the quality to create chances.”

The Hammers boss was left frustrated at the sense of a missed opportunity and that his team was unable to earn a draw that hadn’t seemed implausible during the match.

“Today I think the first goal was a pity for us but I’ve said it. I was happy with the performance think we were able to draw but again they damage us,” he said.

“Against this kind of team, if you make a mistake they don’t forgive. This is the difference they have… A little mistake they punish you, they punish us.

“We have to improve, to know to compete against this kind of team to be close to perfection. 

“Don't make mistakes, be calm, defend well… we have quality players too.”