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Bulgarian striker Dimitar Berbatov helped himself to four goals, with team-mates Steed Malbranque and Jermain Defoe also scoring, while Reading struck through Kalifa Cisse, Ivar Ingimarsson and a Dave Kitson brace.

The defeat means that Reading are still looking for their first away win of the season, with this match being the second time they have scored four goals on their travels and returned home with nothing to show for it.

This was one of those matches which are often held up as a shining example of Premier League football, with exciting attacking intent, full-blooded determination and defensive chaos served up in equal measure

Characteristically at White Hart Lane, Spurs dominated the early possession, and made it count after just six minutes.

Steed Malbranque found Robbie Keane with a well-weighted through ball, and the Irishman squared the ball across goal to give strike partner Berbatov the easiest of tap-ins from inside the six-yard box.

Matches involving Tottenham have averaged over three-and-a-half goals per game this season, so it was no surprise when another was scored just 10 minutes later.

It was also no surprise that it came as the result of a defensive mix-up, as Younes Kaboul ignored Paul Robinson's call for the ball from a Nicky Shorey free-kick. The defender bumped into the goalkeeper in mid-air, and the ball was only cleared as far as Cisse, who struck clinically into the bottom corner of the net from the edge of the area.

Neither manager made a change at half-time, but the match exploded into life when centre back Ivar Ingimarsson was unmarked at a corner and headed Reading into the lead for the first time in the match on 53 minutes.

10 minutes later it was Reading's turn to make a costly defensive error, as Graeme Murty knocked a cross right into the path of Berbatov, with the Bulgarian making no mistake from 10 yards out.

Boyhood Tottenham fan Dave Kitson lost the hapless Younes Kaboul at the near post to glance in a header that restored the Royals' lead and sparked off a spell of five goals in nine minutes.

Two minutes later Berbatov got underneath a header from Pascal Chimbonda and volleyed in a clinical strike to make it 3-3, before Kitson again made a fool of Kaboul and lifted a class finish over Robinson.

Frenchman Steed Malbranque produced the strike of the match with a curling effort into the top corner, before Hahnemann saved a Keane penalty only for Defoe to nod in the rebound and send Spurs into a 5-4 lead.

It was going to take a two-goal cushion to provide any kind of security in this match, and that came when Berbatov chased down a long ball, shrugged off Ingimarsson and fired a strike that Hahnemann could not keep out to seal all three points for Tottenham and leave Reading boss Steve Coppell scratching his head wondering how his side got nothing from the game.

Tony Mabert / Eurosport