Cardiff City 2-2 Sheffield United

Nobody in this fixture had lost coming in, and nobody had won either: two draws each, and Sheffield United arrived without conceding a league goal all season. That record lasted 118 seconds. Cian Ashford found space and slid the ball wide to Jack Moylan, who cut inside and fired Cardiff City in front before much of a 21,036 crowd had settled.

The reply was even faster and it came twice. Alex Robertson brought down Tom Cannon in the fourth minute and Cannon sent Nathan Trott the wrong way from the spot. Three minutes later Patrick Bamford crossed for Callum O'Hare to place the ball into the bottom right corner, and a side that had scored two goals all season suddenly had two in seven minutes at the Cardiff City Stadium. Cardiff steadied, and on 38 Ollie Tanner danced through and forced the save from which Ashford fired into an empty net. Four goals inside 38 minutes, and not another one all afternoon.

The second half was one-way traffic that never paid out. Sky counted 29 Cardiff shots to Sheffield United's 6 by the end. Perry Ng hit the bar late on, Yousef Salech diverted the follow-up wide, and Brian Barry-Murphy emptied his bench in a rush: Willock on 72, then Joel Colwill, Isaak Davies and Callum Robinson together on 85, Scanlon in stoppage time. Krystian Bielik's debut and Gabriel Osho's return from injury were the selection notes on a day that deserved a winner and refused to produce one.

Three draws from three now for Cardiff, and the same for Sheffield United, the side Barry-Murphy called the highest possible challenge before kick-off. On the night the challenge ran the other way: Cardiff had 67 per cent of the ball, outshot the promotion favourites 28 to 6, and reached an expected goals figure of 2.27 to 1.53, yet still left with a point instead of three. Correction, 30 August: an earlier version of this report reversed the shot count.

What Barry-Murphy said

"We're disappointed not to win. It felt as if maybe we should have but we understand Sheffield United have a very strong team in this division so today we have to accept the draw," the Cardiff manager said afterwards. "When you lose two quick goals, it's easy to go away from the game plan but the players showed a lot of courage and a really strong mentality to still play really brave football." On debutant Krystian Bielik: "I thought he had a great debut, really good through the game. In the second half I thought he showed his real quality and calmness and composure."