Krasnodar v Basel facts

Having done the double over Trabzonspor, Krasnodar are back in contention to qualify from Group C and will be looking for a third straight victory as they host a Basel side who beat them 5-0 on Matchday 1 and have already sealed their place in the round of 32.

• Krasnodar beat Trabzonspor 2-0 at home on Matchday 3 and 3-1 away a fortnight later to offset their opening defeats at Basel and at home to Getafe (1-2). The Swiss side clinched their qualification with back-to-back victories over the Spanish club (1-0 a, 2-1 h), Fabian Frei scoring in both games as they moved on to ten points, four ahead of both Krasnodar and Getafe, who meet in Madrid on Matchday 6.

Previous meetings
• Krasnodar's first meeting with Swiss opponents in UEFA competition proved to be a chastening experience as Basel overwhelmed them 5-0 at St. Jakob-Park on Matchday 1, inflicting a heaviest ever European defeat on the Russian side.

• Basel have now played 14 UEFA matches against clubs from Russia, winning seven and losing five. Away from home their record is W2 D2 L3, their last visit producing a 2-0 victory at CSKA Moskva that helped them qualify for the round of 16 in the 2017/18 UEFA Champions League. Their only previous visit to Russia in November brought their other win – 2-0 at Spartak Moskva in the 2002/03 UEFA Champions League first group stage.

Form guide
Krasnodar
• Since making their European debut in the 2014/15 UEFA Europa League, Krasnodar have participated in the competition every season, just once (in 2017/18) failing to reach the group stage. Third place in the 2018/19 Russian Premier League put them into this season's UEFA Champions League third qualifying round, where they memorably defeated Porto on away goals (0-1 h, 3-2 a), but were then well beaten in the play-offs by Olympiacos (0-4 a, 1-2 h).

• Krasnodar were unable to progress from their UEFA Europa League group at the first attempt, in 2014/15, but have succeeded in each of their last three participations, reaching the round of 16 in both 2016/17 and 2018/19, when only a late goal conceded at home to Valencia (1-2 a, 1-1 h) denied them a first ever European quarter-final.

• The Russian club ended a run of five winless European home games, and three successive defeats, by beating Trabzonspor on Matchday 4. They did, however, take maximum points from their three home group fixtures last term, and their all-time record in the group stage now stands at W8 D3 L3.

Basel
• Having won the Swiss Super League eight seasons running from 2009/10 to 2016/17, Basel have finished second to Young Boys in each of the past two campaigns. Last season they missed out on European group stage football for the first time in 15 years, losing to PAOK in the UEFA Champions League second qualifying round and Apollon Limassol in the UEFA Europa League play-offs.

• This season they again missed out on the UEFA Champions League proper, an away-goals success against PSV Eindhoven in the second qualifying round preceding a 5-2 aggregate defeat to Austrian neighbours LASK. That meant a transfer to the UEFA Europa League group stage, where they have competed three times previously, most recently in 2015/16, when they went on to reach the round of 16 before losing to eventual winners Sevilla (0-0 h, 0-3 a). This is the third time in a row that Basel have qualified from their UEFA Europa League group.

• The 2012/13 semi-finalists are unbeaten in their last six UEFA Europa League group fixtures outside Switzerland (W4 D2) and were winners on the road three times out of four in the 2017/18 UEFA Champions League, including that victory at CSKA. Their overall away record in the UEFA Europa League group stage is W5 D3 L3.

Links and trivia 
• Basel's Emil Bergström played in 2016 for Russian club Rubin Kazan alongside current Krasnodar midfielder Ruslan Kambolov.

• Bergström is a Swedish international, as are Krasnodar pair Marcus Berg and Viktor Claesson.

• Basel coach Marcel Koller led Austria to two 1-0 victories against Russia in UEFA EURO 2016 qualification; the defeat in Moscow ended Fabio Capello's reign as Russia's head coach.

The coaches
• Sergei Matveev played as a midfielder for various amateur and lower-league clubs before becoming a coach in 2004. He worked for almost ten years with various teams in the Moscow area, having also had a spell at the Dinamo Moskva academy. From 2013 to 2016 he was on the coaching staff of the Russian football federation, working in the youth sector, and was recruited by Krasnodar in 2019 after obtaining his UEFA Pro coaching licence in order to work in tandem with Murad Musaev.

• A former Swiss international midfielder who won 55 caps between 1982 and his first and last major tournament, EURO '96, Koller spent his entire club career with Grasshoppers from his native Zurich, winning seven league titles and five domestic cups. Early Swiss title successes as a coach with St Gallen and Grasshoppers were followed by spells in Germany with Köln and Bochum before he took charge of Austria in 2011, eventually leading them to UEFA EURO 2016. He became Basel's head coach in August 2018, winning the Swiss Cup in his debut campaign.