Half-time report
Of all the people in the world, Almunia had to pick Bentley to provide an early Christmas gift, but full credit to the ex-Arsenal midfielder who did amazingly well to find the net.

It’s 1-1 at half time and we’ve been on the back foot for much of the half, especially after Spurs took the lead. Sagna, making a comeback in place of Eboue on the right wing, was caught sleeping in the 3rd minute with Gareth Bale almost taking advantage but his shot hit the outside of the post with Almunya covering well.

In the 10th minute, Theo Walcott had one of many half-chances of the half but his left-foot volley went just wide of Heurelho Gomes’ right-hand post.

Five minutes later, Spurs took the lead. After a lot of scrappy play, David Bentley raised the ball up on his knee and volleyed it over Manuel Almunia who was way, way outside his goal. It’s goal of season for BBC. Arsenal’s reaction was not a great one and it was Van Persie who created a number of opportunities but his efforts were all blocked into corner kicks.

In the 36th minute, some magic in a very dull half from the Arsenal team. Cesc Fabregas picked up on the left, tried to curl one in but Gomez does well to save it into a corner. He went for the ball, saying he didn’t touch it and who could blame him? From the resulting corner, he does a mess when failing to make contact with the ball and Mikael Silvestre rises high to score his first goal for Arsenal and what a goal that was.

Sagna, Walcott and Adebayor have been really really poor in this half. Bacary seems not to be match fit yet after the injury, Theo is doing mighty well with his first touch but not knowing what to do after that and Adebayor is having an unlikely quiet game, looking sort of uninterested.

Changes are needed as at half time, it’s Arsenal 1, Tottenham 1.

Line-ups
Two changes by Arsene Wenger for tonight’s North London derby with Emmanuel Adebayor back upfront in place of Nicklas Bendtner and Denilson taking back his position with Song relegated on the bench, a decision I definitely not agree with.

Arsene Wenger said before the match:

I believe what is important is how well Arsenal will play and not who sits on the bench at Tottenham. We have put a run together and that has strengthened our belief. We want to go from strength to strength – we have come back to an interesting position in the league and we are highly convinced that it will be down to our strengths more than anything else.

It is more about how well we will play and I believe that is more important than anything else. I am very confident because we have a very strong united spirit in the dressing room and we want to do well. We have shown that in recent games, we won at Fenerbahce, we won at West Ham United, we have beaten Everton in a convincing way and we want to keep that going.

Half-time report to follow.


Arsenal

01 Almunia, 03 Sagna, 18 Silvestre, 10 Gallas, 22 Clichy, 14 Walcott, 04 Fabregas, 15 Denilson, 08 Nasri, 11 Van Persie, 25 Adebayor

Subs: 21 Fabianski, 02 Diaby, 05 Toure, 12 Vela, 17 Song Billong, 26 Bendtner, 27 Eboue

Tottenham Hotspurs

01 Gomes, 02 Hutton, 22 Corluka, 39 Woodgate, 32 Assou-Ekotto, 05 Bentley, 14 Modric, 08 Jenas, 06 Huddlestone, 03 Bale, 09 Pavlyuchenko

Subs: 21 Cesar, 04 Zokora, 07 Lennon, 10 Bent, 16 Gunter, 18 Campbell, 24 O’Hara