# 1918–19 FC Basel season

The FC Basel 1918–19 season was their twenty-sixth season since the club's foundation on 15 November 1893. The club's chairman was August Rossa who took over from Franz Rinderer at the club's AGM. FC Basel played their home games in the Landhof in the district Wettstein in Kleinbasel. World War I was still being fought as the Swiss season started.

## Overview

Otto Kuhn was team captain and acted, so to say, as coach. Basel played a total of 30 matches in their 1918–19 season. 14 of these were in the domestic league and 16 were friendly matches. There were nine test games played in the Landhof and seven away games. Because of the war, all but one of these friendlies were played against Swiss teams. The war ended on 1 November 1918 and six months later, on 18 May 1919 Basel hosted their only foreign opponents, the German team Freiburger FC. Despite an early lead, the game ended in a 1–2 defeat.
Nine of these friendlies were won and six ended in a sporting defeat. The 27 October 1918 was the Football Association day. The Basel teams played a tournament. The match in the afternoon between Basel and Nordstern Basel was abandoned during play, because following a crude foul, the FCB's right half was injured and had to leave the pitch due to his injury. His team then demanded the exclusion of the Nordstern player, who had already been negatively noted during the morning game. The referee did not respond to the request, therefore the entire FC Basel team walked off the pitch. The referee abandoned the game and awarded the victory forfeit 3:0 to Nordstern.
The domestic league, Swiss Serie A 1918–19, was divided into three regional groups, East, Central and West, each group with eight teams. FC Basel and the two other teams from Basel Nordstern and Old Boys were allocated to the Central group. The other teams playing in this group were Aarau, Luzern and Biel-Bienne and the two teams from La Chaux-de-Fonds, Étoile-Sporting and FC La Chaux-de-Fonds. FC Basel did not play a very good season, suffering six defeats. They ended the season in fifth position with 13 points.
In their 14 league games Basel scored 27 goals and conceded 26. Otto Kuhn was the team's best goal scorer netting six times and Ernst Kaltenbach was second best scorer with four goals. Étoile-Sporting won the group, continued to the finals and won the Swiss championship.

## Players
### Squad members

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.
| No. | Pos. | Nation | Player |
| — | GK | SUI | Arthur Fahr |
| — | GK | SUI | Emil Fehr |
| — | GK | | Paul Rittel (III) |
| — | GK | SUI | Ernst Zorzotti (III) |
| — | DF | | Emil Ganter |
| — | DF | | Karl Kroepfli |
| — | DF | SUI | Hermann Moll |
| — | DF | SUI | Peter Riesterer |
| — | DF | | Anton Rittel |
| — | MF | SUI | Walter Rupprecht |
| — | MF | SUI | Ernst Kaltenbach |
| — | MF | SUI | Jakob Känzig |
| No. | Pos. | Nation | Player |
| — | MF | SUI | Otto Kuhn |
| — | MF | SUI | Fritz Raas |
| — | FW | SUI | Christian Albicker (I) |
| — | FW | SUI | Karl Bielser |
| — | FW | | Rudolf Bredschneider |
| — | FW | | Albert Buser |
| — | FW | | Gustav Buser |
| — | FW | | Wilhelm Dietz (I) |
| — | FW | | Karl Lott (I) |
| — | FW | | Karl Rudin |
| — | FW | | Carl Schloz |
| — | FW | SUI | Karl Wüthrich |

## Results
### Legend

Win  Draw  Loss  Postponed

### Serie A
#### Central Group results
#### Central Group league table

| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification |
| 1 | Étoile-Sporting | 14 | 11 | 2 | 1 | 42 | 9 | +33 | 24 | Advance to finals |
| 2 | Old Boys | 14 | 8 | 3 | 3 | 31 | 18 | +13 | 19 | |
| 3 | Nordstern Basel | 14 | 8 | 3 | 3 | 23 | 15 | +8 | 19 | |
| 4 | La Chaux-de-Fonds | 14 | 8 | 3 | 3 | 32 | 23 | +9 | 19 | |
| 5 | Basel | 14 | 5 | 3 | 6 | 27 | 26 | +1 | 13 | |
| 6 | Aarau | 14 | 5 | 1 | 8 | 13 | 24 | −11 | 11 | |
| 7 | Luzern | 14 | 2 | 3 | 9 | 18 | 27 | −9 | 7 | |
| 8 | Biel-Bienne | 14 | 0 | 0 | 14 | 2 | 46 | −44 | 0 | |