2011–12 FC Basel Season

The 2011–12 season is FC Basel's 119th in existence and the club's 18th consecutive season in the top flight of Swiss football. FC Basel started their season with various warm-up matches against teams from Switzerland, Germany, Georgia, France and Romania and played against Hertha BSC and West Ham United at the 2011 Uhrencup in Grenchen. This season, Basel earned the so-called "Title Hattrick", that is, three consecutive Swiss Super League championships. They won the Swiss Cup after defeating FC Luzern in the final, and reached the knockout phase of the Champions League, losing to the eventual finalists Bayern Munich 1–7 on aggregate.

Club

FC Basel Holding AG

The FC Basel Holding AG (Holding) owns 75% of the club FC Basel (FC Basel 1893 AG) and the other 25% is owned by the club and its members. Chairwoman of the Holding was Gisela Oeri. She owned 91.96% of the Holding's shares. The other 8,04% of the shares were owned by a group of investors, these being Manor AG, J. Safra Sarasin, Novasearch AG, MCH Group AG and Weitnauer Holding AG. As chairwoman of the holding Ms Oeri was also chairwoman of the club. At the AGM Oeri announced that she was stepping down from her position of presiding the club. She handed her shares over to her vice chairman Bernhard Heusler, the finance chief Stephan Werthmüller and Sportdirector Georg Heitz.

Club management

To the beginning of the season the club's board of directors remained in the same constellation as in the previous season. Then at the club's Extraordinary General Assembly on 16 January 2012 the 601 attending members confirmed these three directors in their positions and Adrian Knup joined them to become new vice chairman. They also appointed Oeri as honorary president.

Team management

Overview

At the beginning of the season the German Thorsten Fink remained head-coach. It was to be his third consecutive season. His assistant was Heiko Vogel and fitness coach was Nikola Vidović. Fink brought three youngsters up from the U-21 team, being Arlind Ajeti, Roman Buess and Darko Jevtić. Two players returned after spending the previous season on loan, these were Fabian Frei after his loan to St. Gallen and Pascal Schürpf returned from Lugano. There were also a number of transfers, Radoslav Kováč came from West Ham United, Park Joo-ho transferred in from Júbilo Iwata, Pak Kwang-ryong from Wil and Stephan Andrist signed in from Thun. Two players signed in on free transfers, these being Kay Voser and Marcel Herzog.

At the end of the previous season the club did not renew the contracts with four players, who then had to leave. These were Beg Ferati, Behrang Safari, Matthias Baron and Dominik Ritter. Orhan Mustafi transferred to Grasshopper Club and Sandro Wieser transferred to 1899 Hoffenheim. Three players were loaned out to obtain more playing time, Fwayo Tembo to ES Sahel, Pascal Schürpf to Aarau and Taulant Xhaka to Grasshopper Club.

Another player who left the club was their captain and goalkeeper Franco Costanzo. Costanzo played for FC Basel for five years, in which time they won the Swiss Cup three times and the national Championship also three times. He also played twice in the Champions League group-stages. During this period, he played 141 league games, including cup and international UEFA games he had 199 club appearances. He played his last match for the team on 25 May 2011 and was substituted out in the 87th minute to a standing ovation. He was replaced by his designated successor Yann Sommer.

Head coach Thorsten Fink left the club and on 13 October he signed a contract with Hamburger SV to manage the German Bundesliga club through to 2014. Fink took the coach of Basel's U-21 team Patrick Rahmen with him as his assistant. As replacement for Fink, the club chose his former assistant Vogel, who served as caretaker manager until the winter break. Vogel's first three games in charge of the team were the Swiss Cup fixture on 15 October, a 5–1 away win against FC Schötz, the Champions League Group C fixture on 18 October 2011, a 0–2 home defeat against Benfica, and a 1–0 away win in the Super League against FC Zürich. On 7 December 2011, he guided Basel to the round of 16 in the Champions League, defeating the 2011 runners-up Manchester United 2–1. After 11 games, four of which in the Champions League, with eight wins, two draws and only one defeat, it was announced on 12 December that Vogel had signed as head coach and manager. A few days later, it was also announced that Markus Hoffmann had been signed as an assistant.

On 31 August 2011, Liverpool had announced the release of Philipp Degen following his long-term calf injury. Just a short time later, he made the request to the then Basel manager Fink if he could keep fit with his home club's first team, which was granted. Fink left the club and his replacement Heiko Vogel offered Degen a contract which Degen signed on 20 November 2011.

The Campaign

Domestic league

Basel entered the 2011–12 Swiss Super League as defending champions, saving their one-point margin on FC Zürich by winning 3–0 against FC Luzern on the last day of the 2010–11 Swiss Super League. They began their season on 16 July in Bern against Young Boys. The start of the season was poor, with three draws and two defeats in the first six league matches. The team refound their strengths and things changed to the better. Basel then won ten and drew the other two of the next 12 games. The first half of the domestic season ended on 11 December with the home match against Neuchâtel Xamax. To this point, Basel remained as League leaders.

Basel continued their undefeated run in the domestic season and equaled the Swiss record of longest undefeated run (26 games) in the Swiss league (previously held by Grasshoppers) ironically by beating Grasshoppers 6–3 on 12 May 2012. Although they could not surpass the record, they still managed to defend their Super League title despite losing to Young Boys 2–1 on the final day of the season. As they have done in previous seasons, the title win was celebrated at Barfüsserplatz later that night. After retaining first place, Basel will enter the 2012–13 UEFA Champions League in the second round of qualification.

;Conclusion
The team achieved their aim by winning the championship. The team ended the season with 78 goals scored and 33 goals against. They had the season's best attacking record and the second best defensive record. Alexander Frei was the team's top goal scorer with 24 goals and achieved his personal aim to become league top goal-scorer for the second consecutive year. Marco Streller was the team's second top scorer with 13 goals and he was also second in the league ranking. Third best scorer in the team was Xherdan Shaqiri with nine goals. He was third equal in the league ranking, together with Emmanuel Mayuka from the Young Boys, Vilmos Vanczák from FC Sion and Matías Vitkieviez who played for both Servette and YB. Jacques Zoua had scored seven league goals and Fabian Frei, Benjamin Huggel and Valentin Stocker had each scored four.

Domestic cup

Basel entered the 2011–12 Swiss Cup in the first round of the competition and the team's clear aim was to win the title. In the first round, teams from the Super League and Challenge League were seeded and could not play against each other. In a match, the home advantage was granted to the team from the lower league, if applicable.

;Eschenbach (14 September 2011)
In the first round Basel were drawn against Amateur team FC Eschenbach, who at that time played in the 2. Liga, the fourth tier of Swiss football. The match was played in the Sportplatz Weiherhaus in Eschenbach LU with an attendance of 3,700 spectators. Head coach Thorsten Fink had mixed a number of their youngsters into the team, leaving a number of the regular players at home with a day-off. Although the hosts had the first shot at goal in the first minute, Basel started well, despite having difficulties with the poor condition of the pitch. It lasted only a few minutes before the inevitable occurred, following a long corner from Scott Chipperfield in the 11th minute Benjamin Huggel headed the ball back into the middle and Pak Kwang-Ryong scored his first goal for club. Basel dominated their opponents from then onwards, Stephan Andrist drove a long drive wide and then Jacques Zoua put the ball into the net, but was ruled off-side. In the 36th minute a fine cross from the left found Pak in the middle and his header put the favourites two up. In the following minutes the Eschenbach goalkeeper Amhof had to make a number of saves. To make things worse for him, in the 45th minute he committed a foul on Zoua as he came out too late and the fouled player himself sank the penalty-kick. In the second half Basel spooled the game out and Chipperfield added to the score, but the hosts were unable to achieve a consolation goal. The favourites won 4–0 to qualify for the next round.

;Schötz (15 October 2011)
In the second round of the Cup the teams from the Super League were seeded and could not play each other. In the matches the home advantage was granted to the team from the lower league. Basel were drawn against Schötz

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