ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE Arsenal 4 Tottenham 4: THE TOTTENHAM Hotspur transformation has been maintained, though even some of their travelling supporters will have missed the remarkable finale here.
The contest had lurched into the fourth minute of stoppage time when Luka Modric volleyed onto a post from 25 yards and Aaron Lennon tapped in the rebound to provide the unlikeliest of equalisers.
Spurs remain bottom of the Premier League but they will be buoyed beyond their wildest imagination by the point they secured. Harry Redknapp's appointment already appears a masterstroke.
Such had been their recent wretched record at their fierce rivals across the capital that Spurs might have been forgiven for arriving braced for a battering. The visitors' huddle prior to kick-off represented a last opportunity for the captain, Jermaine Jenas, to steel resolve while home players paced impatiently, ready to unleash a torrent of attacks as Redknapp shivered his way to the bench.
He could draw encouragement that, despite Arsenal monopolising possession, parity remained at the interval even if, by then, the momentum was with the hosts.
Mikael Silvestre's equaliser, flicked in eight minutes before half-time as Alan Hutton failed to track his man and Heurelho Gomes pawed at thin air, had lanced the visitors' early optimism brought by David Bentley's stunning early goal, though there had still been evidence of the Redknapp effect. Players who had laboured under the ancien regime, Benoit Assou-Ekotto and Tom Huddlestone among them, had leapt feverishly into challenges in an attempt to stem the tide. Jenas, too, had been inspirational as he blocked and harried as best he could.
But Tottenham's hopes had initially soared courtesy of an outrageous, if exquisite, piece of early opportunism.
Bentley made only one Premier League appearance for Arsenal, the club that nurtured his talents before selling him to Blackburn Rovers two years ago. Now a Spurs player, he is clearly relishing life under new management, with this an opportunity to showcase what his former manager, Arsene Wenger, had chosen to discard.
Arsenal cursed their inability to wrest a bouncing ball near the halfway line some 13 minutes in, Luka Modric hooking up into the air for Jenas to chest down to Bentley, though few could have expected what was to follow.
The midfielder cushioned the ball on his instep then, having glanced up to see Manuel Almunia off his goal-line, volleyed from 40 yards. The ball arced gloriously, with the startled Spaniard back-pedalling and springing but only to muster a weak palm on the ball as it drifted into the net.
Bentley had been heckled mercilessly up to then. His sprint downfield to celebrate in front of delirious away support was to be expected.
The concession stunned the hosts, but, as they pinged their passes almost unchallenged, confidence steadily crept back. Theo Walcott, William Gallas and Robin van Persie had all gone close by the time Gomes' nerves were exposed at the Dutchman's corner. The Brazilian may be a fine shot-stopper, but his trepidation in the air undermines everything. He was an accident waiting to happen here.
Arsenal sensed that fragility. The second period was barely a minute under way when Gallas, jumping above Vedran Corluka, headed Van Persie's free-kick down and towards the corner where Gomes, rooted to his goal-line on this occasion, saw the ball squirm under his glove and in.
Spurs, their early resolve eroded, played catch-up and should have been buried long before the end. Emmanuel Adebayor somehow contrived to drill past a post from in front of goal as the visitors imploded in a flurry of fouls and bookings. The striker made amends soon after, tapping in ahead of Hutton after Samir Nasri had clipped over the advancing Gomes. And although Darren Bent pulled one back after Almunia had only parried Huddlestone's drive, Van Persie's shot at the far post provided Arsenal with a fourth.
Redknapp, deadpan on the bench, has work to do. But Jenas scored a third for Spurs ahead of the late goal by Lennon.
• Guardian Service
ARSENAL: Almunia, Sagna, Silvestre, Gallas, Clichy, Walcott (Eboue 75), Fabregas, Denilson, Nasri (Song Billong 88), Van Persie (Diaby 81), Adebayor. Subs not used: Fabianski, Toure, Vela, Bendtner. Booked: Diaby.
TOTTENHAM: Gomes, Hutton (Gunter 79), Corluka, Woodgate, Assou-Ekotto, Bentley, Modric, Jenas, Huddlestone, Bale (Lennon 55), Pavlyuchenko (Bent 65). Subs not used: Cesar, Zokora, Campbell, O'Hara. Booked: Assou-Ekotto, Bentley, Huddlestone, Jenas.
Referee: Martin Atkinson(W Yorkshire).
