After three years
©IMAGO
“Now I would like to attack again with FCB,” said Xherdan Shaqiri on his return to FC Basel in mid-August. Three and a half months later, it can be said that the 33-year-old didn’t just say that: Shaqiri leads the Super League’s scorers list with five goals and seven assists. On Saturday in the 3-1 (1-0) win against Servette FC, he single-handedly secured the home win with a hat-trick and ensured that FCB was back at the top of the table after three years.
Shaqiri sank a free kick in the 40th minute and added twice in stoppage time. Although he missed a penalty from the opposing goalkeeper, he converted the follow-up shot. And he scored the final point after a counterattack. For Shaqiri it was the first hat trick at club level. “His winning mentality is exactly what our young players need. Shaqiri is incredible!” said coach Fabio Celestini on the “blue Sport” channel. Ex-professional and TV expert Alex Frei added: “At the moment, as of today, the return of Shaqiri has brought FC Basel back to where they want to be. That has to be said clearly. He is the piece of the puzzle that was probably missing and takes the pressure off the others. That’s why we’re first today.”
FCB are 20-time Swiss champions and secured the title eight times in a row between 2009 and 2017. Since then, the BSC Young Boys took over dominance in Switzerland, while Basel had to settle for second or third place. The low point was reached with fifth place in the 2022/23 season; something like this had not happened in 22 years. Under coach Celestini things went uphill again and now to the top – FCB was last at the top at the beginning of November 2021. Measured by the squad value of 47.1 million euros, FCB is the second strongest force after the Young Boys (65.5 million). However, the Bernese are in a sporting crisis and, as reigning champions, are only ninth in the table.
“It’s very nice to be able to look down from the top again and be at the top again with FC Basel. But it’s just a snapshot. The most difficult thing in football is to maintain consistency and stay up there as long as possible,” said Shaqiri, who collected eleven of his twelve scorer points in the last five games. On average, he contributes a goal every 63 minutes.
Shaqiri was trained at FCB and was a professional there for three years before moving to FC Bayern in 2012 for 11.8 million euros. This made it the most expensive sale in the club’s history at the time. Shaqiri had a successful career at international level in Munich as well as with Inter, Stoke City and Liverpool, winning the Champions League with Bayern in 2013 and with the Reds in 2019. At the end of 2018 he reached the highest market value of his career: 25 million euros. This was followed by two more stops with Lyon and Chicago and a return to Basel in the summer.
“It fills me with pride and I am very happy that I can return to my hometown to FCB today. I have had deep ties to the club and the region since I was a child. As a fan and of course as a player,” Shaqiri said at the time. Now he is well on his way to helping FCB return to its former glory.
