After an opening half-hour in which both goalkeepers were largely redundant, the game sparked into life in the 34th minute. Fellaini dispossessed a dawdling Tom Huddlestone, and his forceful run down the left ended with a cross Gomes, with the help of his defenders, scrambled clear.

Tottenham then broke quickly, with Darren Bent feeding a diagonal pass to Aaron Lennon who, coming in off the right, fired woefully high and wide from a good position.

Under-fire goalkeeper Gomes has been a source of such comedy of late, and Everton almost capitalise on his unsteady hands in the 39th minute.

With the Tottenham defence unwisely retreating, Fellaini unleashed a dipping volley from 20 yards that Gomes parried back into play and, after the ball was not properly cleared, the Everton midfielder returned another drive the goalkeeper fumbled behind for a corner.

Bent then wasted a decent opening when, with more time than he realised, the striker shot hurriedly first-time at Howard after Roman Pavlyuchenko had stepped over a Benoit Assou-Ekotto cross.

Given that Everton had previously played 16 away league games during the calendar year and only conceded first-half goals in two of them, a goalless scoreline at the interval should have come as no surprise.

But they wasted no time in forging ahead six minutes after the break. Lennon fouled Arteta 30 yards from goal on the Everton left and, from the Spaniard’s quickly-taken free-kick, Pienaar lashed a shot that deflected off Corluka to deceive Gomes and nestle into the Tottenham net.

The home side rarely threatened an equaliser.

And when they did find a way through a solid Everton back-line, American goalkeeper Tim Howard continued his fine form from last week with a strong left hand to prevent Pavlyuchenko converting Bentley’s low cross.

Indeed, with Gomes parrying a Pienaar drive and then bravely saving at the feet of the South African to reach Leon Osman’s throughball, Everton appeared the more likely to score again.

Substitute Victor Anichebe almost made the game safe in the closing stages when firing wide from a Fellaini pass, before, with Jagielka impressing, the visitors saw out six minutes of injury time with relative comfort.

A victory, then. But not the ideal way Moyes would have wanted to celebrate his 300th game in charge at Goodison.