For 92 minutes at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium, this looked destined to be Riyad Mahrez's afternoon, a comeback carved and completed by his left foot and then his right. Algeria had trailed twice, hauled themselves level twice, and finally surged in front through their captain in the third minute of added time. The green shirts were already dreaming of three points and top spot. Then, in the sixth minute of stoppage time, Sasa Kalajdzic rose in the centre of the box and headed Austria back into the contest.

It finished Algeria 3, Austria 3, a scoreline that flattered neither defence and thrilled everyone else. This was a World Cup Group J night that swung on every whistle, six goals shared between two sides who refused to accept the last word belonged to the other. By the end, exhaustion and disbelief hung over the pitch in equal measure.

The lead changed hands three times before the drama detonated in stoppage time. For Algeria, it felt like a point stolen. For Austria, a point salvaged. In truth, both descriptions were right, which is precisely why a match like this leaves no one satisfied and no one able to look away.

Trading blows

Austria struck first and struck cleanly. On 28 minutes David Alaba threaded a through ball into the danger zone and Marko Arnautovic did the rest, opening his body and steering a right-footed finish into the bottom right corner. It was the goal of a veteran who knows exactly where the net lives, and it gave Austria a platform their organisation seemed built to protect.

Algeria had other ideas, and on the stroke of half-time Rafik Belghali levelled with a moment of real quality, a left-footed strike from the centre of the box that flew into the top right corner. The timing mattered as much as the technique; instead of trooping off a goal down, Algeria walked into the interval with belief restored and the tie reset.

The pattern that followed was relentless. Ten minutes into the second half Marcel Sabitzer restored Austria's advantage with a superb effort from outside the box, teed up by Konrad Laimer and lashed into the top right corner. Barely five minutes later Mahrez answered, collecting a pass from Houssem Aouar and picking out the top right corner with his left foot. Blow, counter-blow, and neither side flinching.

Mahrez seizes the moment

As the clock ran down, the contest tilted towards the man wearing the armband. Aouar, tireless and inventive, had already laid on one goal for his captain, and in the third minute of added time he found him again, this time with a through ball that split the Austrian rearguard. Mahrez took it in stride and finished with his right foot into the bottom left corner, a different angle, a different foot, the same ruthless certainty.

For a few delirious moments it was the goal that defined the group. Algeria's bench emptied, the momentum of the entire evening seemed to crash decisively their way, and a fixture that had swayed and lurched finally appeared to have settled on a winner. Mahrez had scored twice, both created by Aouar, and the pairing looked like the difference between the two nations.

That it did not stand as the decisive strike takes nothing from the performance. Mahrez carried Algeria's attack, gave it shape and menace, and turned a game they trailed for long stretches into one they very nearly won. His two goals were the work of a forward at the peak of his reading of a match, arriving in the right place at the right instant, twice.

The cruellest twist

The celebrations had barely subsided when Austria constructed their reply. In the sixth minute of added time Michael Gregoritsch nodded the ball down and across, and Kalajdzic climbed to meet it, his header dropping into the bottom right corner. It was the last meaningful act of the match, a substitute's instinct and a header of pure defiance, and it silenced everything green in the stadium.

For Austria, it was a point rescued from a position that had looked lost, testament to a refusal to accept defeat that runs through this squad. Twice they had led and twice been pegged back, and when Mahrez put Algeria ahead in stoppage time the tie seemed beyond them. Kalajdzic decided otherwise, and in doing so kept Austria's grip on the group firmly alive.

For Algeria, the emotions were harder to process. To lead for the first time only in the 93rd minute and then concede within three minutes is a particular kind of anguish, the sort that lingers. They will replay Kalajdzic's leap for a long time, and wonder how a night of such control at the finish slipped through their fingers at the very last.

What it means

A shared point leaves Group J finely poised, with both nations able to point to reasons for encouragement and reasons for regret. Algeria proved they can trade punches with a well-drilled European side and repeatedly find answers, and in Mahrez and Aouar they possess a creative axis capable of unlocking anyone. What they must address is the concentration that evaporated in the closing seconds.

Austria, for their part, will take heart from a resilience that produced goals from Arnautovic, Sabitzer and Kalajdzic, three finishes of contrasting character and shared conviction. Alaba and Laimer supplied the platform and the invention, and the spread of scorers hints at a team that does not rely on a single source. The defensive lapses, though, will trouble them as much as they encourage.

In a group this tight, a draw of this quality tells both camps exactly where they stand. Neither has faltered, neither has broken clear, and the reckoning has simply been postponed. What is certain is that anyone who watched these six goals unfold at Arrowhead knows precisely what these two nations are capable of when the stakes are highest.