AT the start of the season, Tottenham fans would have identified Saturday, September 15 as the date to mark a changing of the guard. It still could be - just not in the way they envisaged.

Arsenal's visit to White Hart Lane was supposed to confirm Spurs' replacement of their rivals in the Premier League top four. Instead, it could herald the departure of Martin Jol following a calamitous start to the season. The only change in North London over the last month has been a shift in Tottenham's ambitions.

While Arsenal have taken ten points from their opening four Premier League matches, Spurs' one win in five has seen them lurch from one crisis to the next.

On the field, an opening-day reverse at Sunderland was followed by a humiliating home defeat to Everton. Off the field, however, things were about to get even worse.

Daniel Levy's ill-advised pursuit of Sevilla boss Juande Ramos has left the unfortunate Jol in a fatally undermined position. Every defeat will leave him looking over his shoulder, wondering if last month's temporary reprieve is about to be reversed.

His authority is non-existent, as it has become clear that the likes of Didier Zokora and Ricardo Rocha were signed against his wishes, and his ability to extract the maximum from those under him must be questionable at best.

As a result, a side that had looked like being Champions League contenders is struggling in the bottom half of the table.

Injuries have hardly helped, but Dimitar Berbatov is strutting around like a player who has read too many glowing reports of his performances last season, Jermain Defoe is growing increasingly disillusioned on the substitutes' bench and Paul Robinson continues to look anything but secure between the posts.

In short, Tottenham are going through exactly the sort of crisis that was supposed to afflict Arsenal this season.

It seems difficult to imagine now but, back at the start of August, most pundits were predicting a season of strife at the Emirates.

David Dein's departure had looked like heralding a protracted boardroom battle involving American tycoon Stan Kroenke. It still could do, of course, but despite Dein's recent decision to sell his remaining shares to Uzbek businessman Alisher Usmanov, the club's hard-earned reputation for good governance continues to hold.

Dein's decision to leave the Arsenal board also looked like hastening Arsene Wenger's departure from the club. The Frenchman had enjoyed a close working relationship with the former vice-chairman and had previously hinted that he would struggle to work without him.

But instead of walking away, Wenger duly signed a three-year contract extension that will keep him at Arsenal until 2011. Another potential crisis was successfully nipped in the bud.

Still, though, there was the small matter of surviving without Thierry Henry. The Frenchman had been providing Arsenal's va-va-voom for the best part of a decade, so his summer move to Barcelona represented the end of an era.

As the opening month of the season has shown, though, there is no reason why the new regime should be any less successful than the last.

If anything, Arsenal appear to be a better side because of Henry's departure. They are certainly a more unified one.

For all of his obvious qualities in front of goal, Henry towered over his team-mates like a behemoth. The majority of his team-mates were in awe of him, and their development unquestionably suffered as a result.

It is hardly a co-incidence that Henry's departure has come at the same time as the likes of Abou Diaby, Denilson and even Tomas Rosicky have really begun to find their feet.

Robin van Persie has assumed his position as the leader of Arsenal's frontline, and the mercurial Cesc Fabregas has replaced him as the team's beating heart.

This afternoon's trip to Tottenham represents a new-look Arsenal's toughest test yet, but they go into it in far better shape than their neighbours. The storm clouds that gathered above the Emirates Stadium at the start of the season have already shifted to White Hart Lane.