The Swiss will want to avoid early relegation with a win against Serbia in the League of Nations on Friday evening. The coach Murat Yakin is still complaining about errors and tinkers in the referee with the squad.
What does the Swiss national team look like in the future? Spectators watch the training on the next pitch in Letzigrund Zurich.
It’s the day before the match against Serbia, Swiss national coach Murat Yakin and player Fabian Rieder taking a seat in the well-filled media room at Zurich’s Letzigrund Stadium. The “League of Nations” is the name of the competition in which the Swiss must win on Friday evening
It corresponds to Yakin’s own attitude that he and the team see this fall in a different way than the results and the table show: the interim balance is 4 games, 1 point, 10 goals conceded. “A lot of bad decisions cost us points, I can’t explain it any other way,” says the national coach. Yakin repeats what he has repeatedly used as an explanation for the missing points: the referees were to blame. This is how you see it if you don’t want to evaluate your own performance or if you want to think about the progress of the personnel change.
Personnel change: That was the motto for the six Nations League games after Germany’s European Championship summer fairytale. Yakin was not wrong when he said: “ Because the participation of the next final round is more important. This harvest should therefore provide information on the personnel that the Swiss are looking to begin their upcoming qualification for the 2026 World Cup.
Groping around in the same darkness as a year ago?
So far little has been seen of large logs. The games against Serbia and Spain now provide an opportunity to correct the impression that Yakin and his team are floundering around in the same darkness as they were a year ago.
At that time, European Championship qualification ended with a 0-1 defeat in Romania and the question of whether Yakin was the right coach for the European Championship competition. Not only journalists asked this question, but also Pierluigi Tami, the director of the national team. The question may soon be: Is Yakin the right coach to shape a team from the large number of younger players who will qualify for the 2026 World Cup in the long term?
Fortunately for Yakin this question is not fit. Because he proved at the European Championships that he can be a successful coach in the tournament, he corrected the other picture of the World Cup 2022 with the debacle 1:6 against Portugal. But Yakin has yet to solve the task of shaping and driving change.
Such a change was planned and successfully implemented by Ottmar Hitzfeld after failing to qualify for the 2012 European Championships. Vladimir Petkovic made a similar transformation in 2018 after the World Cup in Russia. Even if Yakin’s immediate predecessor was disastrous in terms of communication, Petkovic’s feeling was also right looking for alternatives to Valon Behrami, Blerim Dzemaili, Gelson Fernandes, Johan Djourou and Stephan Lichtsteiner. The round of 16 win against France at the 2021 European Championship proved Petkovic right.
The gaps Sommer, Schär and Shaqiri
Well, this fall, after the resignation of Yann Sommer, Fabian Schär and Xherdan Shaqiri, it was clear one way or another that the team had to change. So far it is clear that Gregor Kobel – recovered from hip problems and in goal against Serbia – is a goalkeeper with new long-term prospects for the team. Yakin answers which personnel the defense should form and how the gap created by Shaqiri’s departure could be closed differently from game to game and time and time again with tips.
So Breel Embolo, when he is in form and has a clearer head than when he missed the penalty in Serbia recently, is the first striker. Granit Xhaka is more than ever the boss of the midfield. Manuel Akanji is the patron saint of defence. But what the new staff building around this scaffolding will look like is still a sketch at the moment.
Fabian Rieder is part of this sketch. The fact that he and not a veteran is sitting on the podium the day before the match against Serbia is a sign that the change in the squad should be linked to the 22-year-old. “The direction is clear,” says Rieder, and the team spirit is “great.” You wouldn’t hear anything different from a national player before a game, but Rieder has the most experience in the national team of the youngest. After a difficult year and a broken metatarsal at Rennes, he is now on loan at VfB Stuttgart and plays regularly.
The Bernese player has played 14 international games and has been involved in the last two finals. He made his World Cup debut in Qatar against Cameroon at left midfield and, quite unexpectedly, was used at right back in the second group game against Brazil. At the European Championships in Germany, Rieder had match practice in all five matches, all of them in attacking midfield.
Coach Murat Yakin gave Fabian Rieder match practice in every match at the European Championships in Germany.
Rieder is a great example of “versatility”, ie the ability to use it in different ways. Yakin sees Rieder’s position providing offensive impetus behind Embolo, as Shaqiri once did. Rieder listens to Yakin carefully. He knows the sketch.
Yakin’s plan for the defense is open, in which only Ricardo Rodriguez is available as a veteran after Akanji’s injury-related absence. Nico Elvedi, Becir Omeragic, Leonidas Stergiou and Gregory Wüthrich are injured, Silvan Widmer and Cédric Zesiger are not in the squad.
So, together with Rodriguez, Yakin should find a solution from the newcomers Aurèle Amenda, Albian Hajdari and Miro Muheim. Ulisses Garcia and Kevin Mbabu, who have suddenly survived, are options. It would be great if all of this resulted in a plan for the future. According to Yakin, it’s also clear that forward Noah Okafor – who was put on a ”thinking break” after the European Championship – will get playing minutes.
What challenges is the Swiss national football team facing under coach Murat Yakin?
The excerpt discusses the current state of the Swiss national football team and its coach, Murat Yakin, following a series of disappointing results. Yakin acknowledges that he and his team interpret their recent performance differently from what is reflected in their standings, attributing the loss of points to bad decisions and refereeing rather than their own shortcomings. The narrative reflects on Yakin’s previous success during the European Championships and contrasts it with current challenges, particularly after key players like Yann Sommer, Fabian Schär, and Xherdan Shaqiri departed from the squad. The article stresses the need for a personnel change to prepare for future competitions, emphasizing the importance of integrating younger players like Fabian Rieder, who has been gaining experience and confidence. As the team looks ahead, questions remain about Yakin’s ability to successfully drive this transformation and build a competitive squad moving toward the 2026 World Cup qualifications.