Arsenal vs Tottenham match report: Kieran Gibbs rescues point after Harry Kane goal in north London derby

Arsenal 1 Tottenham 1

Kieran Gibbs steers the ball home to equalise (Getty Images)

This was Arsenal’s big chance to go two points clear at the top and they blew it. It was Tottenham’s chance to win at the home of their rivals and they blew that too. Both sides missed their opportunity here today, and will spend the next two weeks regretting it.

This was an engrossing, surprising derby which Spurs dominated and which they should have won comfortably. Harry Kane gave them the lead but they missed all of their second-half chances to go 2-0 up. Arsenal looked as if they had nothing in reserve, and Arsène Wenger’s three substitutes, when chasing the game, were all defensive players. And yet it was Kieran Gibbs, standing in as a left-winger, who bundled in the crucial equaliser with 13 minutes left.

The fact that Arsenal rescued one point from this game is impressive and important, and testament to the fact that they did not wilt in the face of a superior Spurs display. But this was Arsenal’s opportunity to put daylight between themselves and Manchester City, who had just drawn 0-0 at Villa Park. Rather than rise to that challenge, Arsenal shrunk away from it.

If this game was a test of Arsenal’s title credentials, of whether they have the physical and emotional resources to keep pace with Manchester City or even pull away from them, they did not conclusively pass it. Playing at home, against their biggest rivals, with the incentive of going clear at the top, Arsenal never got control of this game, never played with any real authority or impetus.

Wenger could only make one change from the side which was taken apart in Munich on Wednesday night – Laurent Koscielny recovered from injury to replace Gabriel – and Arsenal looked like they were still trying to shake that defeat off. Wenger said in his press conference on Friday that he was “very concerned” by his team’s injury list and events on the pitch here vindicated him.

Arsenal started frantically, playing like a team trying to kill the game in the first 10 minutes, but when that did not work they did not have many other ideas. Santi Cazorla had to be taken off at half-time complaining of dizziness, having been off the pace in the first half. Alexis Sanchez is still not at his physical peak, and the injuries in attacking positions have taken an awful lot out of this side. With no Theo Walcott, Jack Wilshere, Aaron Ramsey, Danny Welbeck or Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, this is an Arsenal team lacking incision, pace and goals.

The best football Arsenal have played this season was with Walcott as centre-forward, and this was one of those afternoons when Olivier Giroud looked like a good player not quite cut out for leading the line at the very top level. He is simply not as quick as Walcott and so does not give Arsenal that dangerous option of running in behind. Tottenham could defend high up the pitch with little risk of being caught out that way.

Arsenal were forced to go direct in the second half, and Giroud missed four chances, two of them very good. Five minutes after the re-start he was unmarked six yards out and headed Mesut Özil’s free-kick on to the bar. Five minutes after that, he was free again in the box, meeting Özil’s corner, but managed to miss the target. Had Giroud not headed the ball then Koscielny, behind him, would certainly have scored.

The problem for Arsenal, as they saw Spurs take the lead, then take control of the game, was that they had so few game-changing options on the bench. Wenger introduced Mathieu Flamini at half-time, then Gibbs and Mikel Arteta in the second half. Gibbs certainly took his goal very well, getting a run on Kyle Walker at the far post, meeting Özil’s cross with too much power for an unbalanced Hugo Lloris. But this was an unusual outcome, and not one that Arsenal can hope to rely on too many more times this season if they want to win the league.

Momentum being as powerful as it is, Arsenal were the only team who threatened to win the game in the final 13 minutes, as Lloris had to save from Gibbs and Giroud to preserve one point for his side, who might well have taken all three.

For 70 minutes this was as well as Spurs have played away from home under Mauricio Pochettino. They showed character and courage, snapping away at Arsenal and bossing the midfield. Mousa Dembélé and Dele Alli took advantage of Cazorla’s struggles and asserted themselves in the middle of the pitch. Once Spurs had seen off Arsenal’s early burst, they took control and started to create the best chances.

There was an early warning sign when Eric Dier was unmarked from an Christian Eriksen free-kick, which he headed wide, but the next time Spurs breached Arsenal’s defence they capitalised. Danny Rose had time on the ball at left-back and Per Mertesacker stepped up, hoping to play Kane off-side. Koscielny did not follow, though, allowing Kane to bend his run in behind him, springing the faulty off-side trap. Kane ran through on goal, opened his body up and put the ball in the far bottom corner.

The frustration for Spurs was that, having taken the lead, they could not see out what would have been their first win at the Emirates for five years. There was a spell half-way through the second half when that felt like the only possible result. Eriksen played a delightful through ball to Kane in the inside-right channel, but he dragged his shot wide. Then Kane met a Danny Rose cross but headed over the bar. The best chance came from an Erik Lamela corner, which Toby Alderweireld headed powerfully but too close to Petr Cech, whose reactions kept Arsenal in the game.

Had Alderweireld scored then that surely would have been that, sending Spurs into the break in fifth place, two points behind Arsenal. But he did not, Spurs tired, and Gibbs, not a likely super sub, came on three minutes later. He changed the game and sent everyone home with a sense of what might have been.