FC Zurich v Luzern

It has been a humbling week for Swiss Super League champions FC Zurich after the highs of last season. They were brushed aside by YB in Bern last weekend by a 4-0 scoreline before making the long trip to Baku in UEFA Champions League qualifying where they would lose out again, 3-2 to Qarabag. After significant personnel changes on the sideline and on the pitch itself, it is clear that this isn’t the same side that romped to their first title since 2009.

Luzern remained in cold storage for another week after a delay in laying the new pitch at the swissporarena forced their scheduled opener against Grasshoppers to be postponed until August. They did use the time wisely, playing a friendly with Genoa to cap off a successful pre-season preparation that has brought four wins from five.

There has been a lot of change at Luzern too this summer, they lost Filip Ugrinic to YB and Marvin Schulz to the 2. Bundesliga, bringing in 20-goal Challenge League striker Joaquin Ardaiz to offset some of those losses and also Pius Dorn who looks to be a replacement for Silvan Sidler and Simon Grether, two fullbacks that also departed in the last couple of months. FCZ seem to be lacking some confidence at the beginning of this new season and there are some real question marks over their defending after shipping seven goals in two games. This is a typically high-scoring encounter and I believe Luzern can take advantage of those defensive woes. As a result, I think we’ll see goals at both ends at the Letzigrund on Saturday

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St. Gallen v Winterthur

St. Gallen were another of the teams from last weekend that much more was expected off to begin the season. That being said, their loss in Geneva came about via that stunning strike by Rodelin, and they also should’ve taken at least a point from the game with the number of chances they created, sixteen in total. The visit of newly-promoted Winterthur to kybunpark will be a welcome opportunity to get the first victory on the board.

Winterthur shouldn’t be underestimated, of course, they held Basel to a draw last Saturday and were one wonderful, last-ditch defensive block away from taking all three. This trip to eastern Switzerland represents a totally different challenge for the team though and it’ll be interesting to see how they fare away from the passionate atmosphere at their Schutzenwiese home.

FCSG are one of the most potent attacking sides in the Super League, they scored a frightening 47 goals in 19 league games in the second half of last season after strengthening significantly in the January window. Winterthur didn’t keep many clean sheets on the road in the Challenge League and that won’t change with this step-up in opposition. The home side can flex their muscles here and grab a couple of goals in the process.

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FC Basel v Servette

After a disappointing 1-1 draw to start the season at Winterthur, FC Basel were glad to bounce back with victory in the UEFA Europa Conference League on Thursday evening. A relatively straightforward first leg with Crusaders FC of Northern Ireland threatened to become more complicated after the dismissal of Taulant Xhaka for two yellow cards in two minutes, but FCB were able to control the tie despite the disadvantage and ran out 2-0 winners after goals from Dan Ndoye and Adam Szalai.

Servette FC may have had an uneventful pre-season, but they started the 22/23 league campaign with a bang. Their game with St. Gallen began with a wonder strike by Ronny Rodelin from 47.4m in the fifth minute and SFC held out for the remainder of the contest to seal the win. St. Gallen would’ve felt hard done by given the number of attempts they had on goal, but they couldn’t change the narrative at the Stade de Geneve. That goal was the talking point of the week in Swiss football, going viral and totalling over 1m views on Twitter.

FCB will take confidence from their midweek showing and have enjoyed the occasions that their visitors from Geneva have come to St. Jakob-Park recently. FCB have scored five against Servette at home twice in the last three matches and I don’t think they’ll have any problems scoring past an SFC team that was pretty fortunate to keep a clean sheet and the three points last weekend.

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Grasshoppers v Lugano

Grasshoppers will finally get their season underway after a week-long delay as they welcome Lugano to the Letzigrund.

It was a pretty mixed bag for GC in their return to the Super League in 21/22. They started relatively well before struggling badly in the middle of the season, recording only nine wins all season. Three of those wins came in the last seven matches, results that went a long way to securing their survival. It was too close for comfort though, they avoided the relegation play-off only due to their superior goal difference compared to Luzern.

There aren’t many predicting big things for the club in 22/23. They lost both their top scorer and most creative player in pre-season with the departures of Kaly Sene and Ermir Lenjani respectively. They have brought in four players in the window so far, but their squad looks much weaker than it did in the last campaign.

Lugano were stunned by Sion at the Cornaredo last week as they lost out 3-2 to their unfancied visitors. Despite that result, I still have faith in the Ticino club to come good. They have assembled a strong squad and I think they have enough to avoid defeat against this GC side in Zurich.

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