Gary Neville has admitted that he expected Tottenham Hotspur to be completely overwhelmed in the North London Derby and for Arsenal to emerge comfortably victorious.
Although Spurs went into the game level on points with their North London rivals and had arguably played the better football in the first five league games of the season, most pundits had backed the Gunners to win comfortably on Sunday (talkSPORT).
That was perhaps due to Tottenham’s poor record at the Emirates Stadium allied with the fact that many expect Mikel Arteta’s side to be Manchester City’s closest challengers again for the Premier League title.
However, Spurs not only emerged with a deserved point from the game but they did so while refusing to abandon their style of play.
(Photo by Marc Atkins/Getty Images)
Spurs went above and beyond Neville’s expectations
The Lilywhites also showed plenty of character as they went behind twice in the game, only to hit back quickly on both occasions, with Neville admitting that he was surprised by the steel that Ange Postecoglou’s men showed.
The pundit said on The Gary Neville Podcast after the 2-2 draw: “I’ll be honest with you today before the game I thought Arsenal were going to win. I thought Arsenal were going to win this match.
“I thought they would win quite comfortably, I thought the quality difference would be too big and I thought we’d see a little bit of the old Spurs in respect of when it really gets tough we’ll see them be overwhelmed and we haven’t done.
“So, I’m pleasantly surprised sat here tonight. I don’t re-write history, I didn’t say that before the game. But the reality is that’s how I felt.”
Spurs Web Opinion
I was fearing the worst before the game and felt that there was a chance that we would get ripped apart if we committed bodies forward.
It seemed like the game was heading that way in the first 30 minutes as our players looked quite nervous and were making some poor mistakes while building out from the back.
However, we were excellent once we grew into the encounter and controlled large parts of the second half.
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