Tenacity: Villa's Martin O'Neill

Another frustrating White Hart Lane Saturday for Tottenham. It would be a little harsh to suggest that an Aston Villa side who defended superbly throughout weren't worthy of a point for sheer effort alone, but the home side will know that with some better finishing, they would have regained the fourth spot they lost to Liverpool earlier yesterday.

Tottenham created plenty of chances, a good dozen of them over the course of the 90 minutes, but try as they might, they could not find the back of the net. Martin O'Neill praised the "effort, application and tenacity" of his side, while Harry Redknapp couldn't fault his men. "We played well, created all the chances and couldn't get the break. They got some great blocks in to be fair. We were the better side but it's all to play for."

It is, and fourth position you suspect will change on a week-to-week basis but yesterday, Tottenham dominated most of the game with their crisp football and, it must be said, the odd long ball to Peter Crouch. Only last ditch challenges inside the penalty area from Richard Dunne, on Crouch, and Carlos Cuellar, on Luka Modric, stopped the home side from taking the lead inside the first 25 minutes and then Brad Friedel weighed in with a couple of fine stops of his own.

First, he got behind a Tom Huddlestone drive from a full 30 yards to parry the ball to safety and on 41 minutes, the US keeper flicked out his right hand to bat away a Ledley King shot from point-blank range. Villa, meanwhile, offered little but they did prove what a dangerous counter-attacking side they are when Heurelho Gomes dived low to parry a Jamie Milner shot from the edge of the box on 28 minutes and got back on his feet immediately to deflect Gabby Agbonlahor's follow up effort away for a corner.

That, however, was a rare scare for Tottenham and although the visitors got a better foothold in the game after the break, the chances continued to fall to Spurs. Friedel denied Huddlestone on the hour after some neat interplay between Crouch and Jermain Defoe allowed the midfielder time for a shot and with 13 minutes left man of the match Dunne blocked a goal bound left-footed effort from Bentley.

Shortly after, Cuellar dived bravely in front of a Crouch shot from the edge of the penalty area to help it on its way past Friedel's right-hand post and in the dying moments, the Villa keeper denied Defoe and saw Crouch flick a back-heel just wide.

In the midst of all that late action, Defoe went down under contact from Stilian Petrov inside the penalty area. Referee Chris Foy waved play on but others might have given it. And yet, despite all that, Villa might have won it in injury time when King brilliantly threw his body in the way of an Ashley Young shot that might have flown into the net. It would have been unfair. But these things can happen if you don't take your chances.