Marked for Žan Celar
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad7 Dec 2026
Kaio Eduardo in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Basel this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Dec 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Metinho
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Metinho has come out of that comparison in the side, and Basel have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
When it matters, Metinho plays
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Not a new contract, not a new number: a new place in the manager’s thinking, which is the only promotion in football that actually matters. Philip Otele has moved up it.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
Mirko Salvi gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Market7 Dec 2026
The Metinho question follows Basel around
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Metinho’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Market7 Dec 2026
Talks stall between Basel and Jota
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Match7 Dec 2026
Continental football is in reach for Basel
23 points from position 5. The title is somebody else’s business and the drop is somebody else’s problem; what is left is the argument about passports.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match18 Nov 2026
Basel march on in the cup
Grasshopper are out and Basel go through, 2‑1 the final word. The bracket opens up a little, and everyone allows themselves a look at it.
Match18 Nov 2026
Basel win it in stoppage time
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 116th minute. Grasshopper will replay every second of the added time for a week.
The terraces23 Nov 2026
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Žan Celar was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.74. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Match18 Nov 2026
Nobody wins at Basel
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Ninety minutes of Kazeem Olaigbe at his very best
Marked 8.37. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Basel.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Kevin Rüegg, and the manager let it.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Tempers go at Basel
Raimundo Rebolledo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match22 Oct 2026
Basel do the business in Europe
3‑1. Continental football is where a club finds out what it actually is, and Basel came through the finding-out well against Dila.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Marked 8.11 at 20, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Squad26 Oct 2026
6 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Xherdan Shaqiri, 35, rolls back the years — 8.24
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.24 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad26 Oct 2026
A falling-out at Basel
Flavius Daniliuc and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match24 Oct 2026
1‑2 to Grasshopper, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Marked 8.29 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
Metinho left out for the big one
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Metinho will call it something else in private.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
In brief
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Squad
Too much change too quickly at Basel
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The dugout
Haris Widmer: “No excuses”
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The dugout
The manager makes an example of Žan Celar