Full-time: Sunderland 2 Tottenham Hotspur 2

SUNDERLAND twice came from behind to claim an unlikely point despite having been outplayed for long periods of their 2-2 draw with Tottenham.

Adam Johnson’s fourth-minute solo goal cancelled out an even earlier strike from Nacer Chadli, but after surviving a series of scares in the first half, the Black Cats fell behind again when Christian Eriksen scored from close range at the start of the second period.

Spurs hit the woodwork twice as they failed to make their superiority count, and Mauricio Pochettino’s side were punished with eight minutes left.

Harry Kane turned Jordi Gomez’s free-kick into his own net to ensure Sunderland claimed their third draw from the opening four league games of the season.

Gus Poyet made one change to the side that had lost at QPR before the international break, with new signing Ricardo Alvarez replacing Steven Fletcher, who was not even on the bench.

Alvarez lined up on the right-hand flank, with Johnson switching to the left and Connor Wickham moving up front as a lone striker.

Johnson was a central figure in a sensational opening six minutes that saw a goal from each side and Tottenham going close to scoring on a further three occasions.

Barely 50 seconds had passed when former Sunderland loanee Danny Rose raced on to Eriksen’s slipped pass on the overlap, but his low shot was parried by Vito Mannone.

Spurs did not have to wait much longer for their opener though, as less than 60 seconds later, Chadli was wheeling away in celebration after finding the net.

Mannone parried Emmanuel Adebayor’s side-footed shot from the edge of the 18-yard box, but Chaldi reacted quickest to slot home the rebound from close range.

The visitors would have been delighted with such an early lead, but their advantage lasted less than two minutes before Johnson struck for Sunderland.

Looking much more at home on the left, the winger received the ball from Seb Larsson, cut in from the flank, and dribbled between two Spurs defenders before slotting an excellent finish past Hugo Lloris.

With the game having started at a breakneck pace, there was barely time to blink before Spurs were carving out two more excellent opportunities.

Chadli drilled in a low shot from the left-hand side that Mannone did well to claw away, before Sunderland’s Italian keeper was forced to race from his line to block Adebayor’s shot after the striker was released through the middle by a delightful chip from Eriksen.

Eriksen caused problems throughout the first half, and with Erik Lamela and Moussa Dembele also dominating the midfield area, Sunderland were on the back foot for most of the afternoon.

Neither Seb Larsson nor Jack Rodwell were able to get close enough to Tottenham’s midfielders, and with Rose causing havoc with his overlapping runs down the left, the home side’s back four was camped on the edge of its own 18-yard box for long periods.

Dembele came within inches of restoring Spurs’ lead when he cracked a fierce 38th-minute strike against the left-hand post with Mannone well beaten, and Chadli would almost certainly have scored on the stroke of half-time had the covering Lee Cattermole not produced an excellent sliding challenge in his own area.

Sunderland desperately need a change of approach at the start of the second half, but having conceded a goal in the early stages of the first period, the hosts did exactly the same again after the interval.

Chadli had far too much space from which to deliver a low cross from the left, and after Patrick van Aanholt’s attempted clearance hit Wes Brown, Eriksen was left with the simplest of tasks to tap home the loose ball from inside the six-yard box.

The overall pattern of the second half remained unchanged from the first, with Tottenham completely dominant in midfield and Sunderland’s players spending large periods of the game camped close to their own 18-yard box.

Poyet finally changed things with 25 minutes remaining, bringing on Emmanuele Giaccherini and Will Buckley for Larsson and Alvarez.

The alterations at least provided some positive impetus, and Johnson flashed a low 22-yard drive just past the post as Sunderland strove for a second equaliser.

That proved a brief flurry at the Spurs end though, and normal service was quickly resumed with the visitors reasserting their dominance.

The excellent Lamela shuffled the ball inside van Aanholt, but with Mannone beaten, his curled effort rebounded off the crossbar.

However, with just a one-goal deficit to make up, Sunderland always had a chance to get back into the game, and they grabbed a remarkable equaliser with eight minutes left.

Gomez delivered a free-kick from the left which evaded everyone in the Spurs six-yard box, but an unsighted Kane was unable to get out of the way and the ball simply hit him before trundling over the goalline.

Remarkably, after having been outplayed for almost all of the game, Sunderland finished the game pushing hardest for a winner, and it almost arrived in the final minute.

Giaccherini fed van Aanholt as he made an overlapping run down the left, but while the defender’s pull back set up Buckley, the former Brighton midfielder side-footed well over the crossbar.

Sunderland (4-1-4-1): Mannone; Vergini, Brown, O’Shea, van Aanholt, Cattermole; Johnson, Larsson (Giaccherini 65), Rodwell (Gomez 79), Alvarez (Buckley 65); Wickham.

Subs (not used): Pantilimon (gk), Jones, Bridcutt, Altidore.

Tottenham (4-2-3-1): Lloris; Dier, Kaboul, Chiriches, Rose; Dembele, Capoue; Lamela, Eriksen (Lennon 86), Chadli (Stambouli 70); Adebayor (Kane 79).

Subs (not used): Vorm (gk), Naughton, Fazio, Townsend.