Two Late Goals. One Manager Has the Harder Question Now
Algeria drew 3-3 with Austria at GEHA Field in Kansas City on June 28, 2026, in their final Group J match, a result that sends both teams through to the round of 32 while ending Iran’s tournament hopes by default. Six goals, three of them after the 55th minute, and a finish so chaotic that the team celebrating an away win one minute was conceding from a header the next. Both managers leave Kansas City with their sides through. Only one leaves with real questions about why his team kept letting the other one back in.
Here is what actually happened, stripped of the noise. Marko Arnautovic put Austria ahead in the 28th minute, Rafik Belghali equalized right on the stroke of half-time, Marcel Sabitzer restored Austria’s lead in the 55th, Riyad Mahrez leveled again in the 60th, Mahrez struck a second time in the third minute of stoppage time to put Algeria ahead, and Sasa Kalajdzic headed in an equalizer barely ninety seconds later. Algeria finished with 1.67 expected goals to Austria’s 1.49, numbers that undersell just how transparent both back lines were all night.
Vladimir Petkovic gets the better of this analysis, and the decision behind it is specific. Sending on Houssem Aouar’s supply line stayed untouched through the 71st-minute triple change, while Petkovic refreshed the legs around him with Belaid, Ait-Nouri, and Chergui. The logic was simple. Algeria’s most dangerous outlet all night ran through Aouar’s vision, and rather than disrupt that thread, Petkovic protected it and replaced fatigue everywhere else. Aouar rewarded that trust with two assists in the closing fifteen minutes, the second one slicing Austria open with a through ball that should never have been on for a player carrying that much of the game’s creative weight already.
Ralf Rangnick’s decision deserves real credit too, even though it backfired in the most literal sense. Throwing on Sasa Kalajdzic in the 90th+5th minute, with Austria still trailing 3-2, was a pure aerial gamble built on the simplest logic in football: when you need a header in a crowded box, put your tallest man in it. It worked perfectly. Within ninety seconds, Kalajdzic had nodded in Michael Gregoritsch’s cross to rescue a point that looked gone. The substitution achieved exactly what it was designed to do.
The problem for Rangnick sits earlier than that, and it is the number that follows him into the round of 32. Austria conceded three goals in the final fifteen minutes of this match, the most of any team in the tournament over that stretch. David Alaba’s defensive line, replaced at center-back by Kevin Danso in the 62nd minute, simply could not contain Algeria’s late surge no matter who wore the shirt. A team that builds an attacking gamble to rescue a point should not have needed rescuing in the first place.
For all the talk of Mahrez’s brace stealing this game late, Algeria gave up two leads themselves, and that habit will not survive a knockout match against Switzerland.
Petkovic now faces a side managed by his own former assistant, in a tie shaped entirely by his pre-tournament history with that federation. Algeria’s defense conceded 1.49 expected goals to a team they should have shut out for long stretches, and Switzerland will carry sharper finishing into the round of 32 than Austria showed in open play tonight.
Neither job is under any threat. Both teams advance, and a 3-3 draw that sends both sides through carries none of the sting of elimination. Still, Petkovic leaves Kansas City in the stronger position. His substitutions solved a problem in real time. Rangnick’s solved one his own defense had already created twice. Algeria walk away with knockout football ahead of them and a manager who trusted the right player at the right moment. Austria walk away grateful that Kalajdzic is tall.