Marked for Bećir Omeragić
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 38. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match14 Nov 2026
8 unbeaten for Basel
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 8 matches without defeat is a foundation Basel did not have in the autumn.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words exchanged at Basel
Xherdan Shaqiri and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match14 Nov 2026
The run at home goes on for Basel
10 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Mattia Zanotti falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad16 Nov 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Moussa Cissé and Basel agree another 4 years.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Bećir Omeragić has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Basel will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Steven Rieder chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings12 Oct 2026
Xherdan Shaqiri, 35, rolls back the years — 7.97
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.97 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Tempers go at Basel
Bećir Omeragić 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.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Miguel Trauco arrives at the club he grew up with
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Miguel Trauco has, at Basel, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Match10 Oct 2026
At last: Basel win one
6 matches without a win, and then this, against Lugano. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Basel training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mattia Zanotti is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Player ratings12 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 20. 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.
Match10 Oct 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Ibrahim Salah. 2‑1 against Lugano, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Mattia Zanotti
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market12 Oct 2026
One of our own: Michel Embolo joins the Basel first team
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Michel Embolo is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match1 Oct 2026
A chastening European night for Basel
1‑4 against Haladas. The honest reading is not that the players were poor; it is that the distance between this club and that one is currently measured in things money takes years to buy.
Match3 Oct 2026
Basel taken apart
1‑4 to Sion, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Match5 Oct 2026
The view from the top for Basel
18 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Julien Duranville, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.21
A mark of 8.21 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Match3 Oct 2026
The wait goes on for Basel
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Squad5 Oct 2026
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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
A row about effort at Basel
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mattia Zanotti was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Bećir Omeragić, and the manager let it.
The terraces5 Oct 2026
At 20 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.
In brief
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Squad
Jonas Harder signs on for more
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Boardroom
Nobody left the Basel dressing room in a hurry
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The dugout
The manager’s verdict
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match17 Sep 2026
A European night to remember for Basel
0‑0 against Pogon, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words exchanged at Basel
Xherdan Shaqiri and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match19 Sep 2026
The run is over for Basel
8 matches without defeat, and then Thun. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.
Match19 Sep 2026
Basel come up short against Thun
Thun left with the points after a 0‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Mattia Zanotti falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Looking ahead21 Sep 2026
Derby week at Basel
Zurich next, which means a week that starts on Monday. Everything else on this page will be forgotten by Saturday; this fixture will not be forgotten for a year.
Boardroom21 Sep 2026
Nobody left the Basel dressing room in a hurry
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
16 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match29 Aug 2026
No mercy from Basel
St. Gallen will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Basel were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Market31 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
No sign of nerves from Julien Duranville at 20 — 8.36
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Julien Duranville did not need any: 8.36, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Match29 Aug 2026
Basel make it 4 in a row
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Basel have 4 straight wins of it.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Basel asked and Luzern said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Market31 Aug 2026
The phone has started ringing about Jonas Harder again, and this time the name on the line is Grodig. Basel are listening politely and promising nothing.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Basel
Mattia Zanotti and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The terraces31 Aug 2026
At 20 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.
Match29 Aug 2026
Basel keep winning on the road
3 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match22 Aug 2026
No mercy from Basel
Grasshopper will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Basel were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.11, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market24 Aug 2026
Basel spend $7.6M to raise the standard
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $7.6M has been paid because Mattia Zanotti is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Market24 Aug 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market24 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
The offer went to St. Gallen this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Market24 Aug 2026
The name of Ibrahim Salah has come up in conversations Basel were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Match22 Aug 2026
Basel make it 3 in a row
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Basel have 3 straight wins of it.
Squad24 Aug 2026
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.
In brief
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The terraces
The town asked, and Basel paid $7.6M
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Player ratings
Philip Otele runs at them all day
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Player ratings
Ninety minutes of Ibrahim Salah at his very best