ZURICH. New coach, same story. Grasshoppers began life under Olaf Janssen with a 2-0 home defeat against Young Boys on Sunday, as second half goals from Samuel Essende and Christian Fassnacht kept the Bernese unbeaten after ten rounds of the Super League season.
For 45 minutes at the Letzigrund, the plan worked. Janssen, hired after Peter Zeidler paid for two defeats and ten goals conceded with his job, set up a compact block that at times fielded six defenders, and the visitors were held to a first half in which Essende and Cédric Zesiger both found only the frame of the goal in stoppage time.
The Bernese needed one opening, and it came four minutes after the restart: Isaac Schmidt found Essende, whose curling shot beat the goalkeeper for his eleventh goal of the season. Three minutes later Fassnacht made it two, and the evening reverted to the season’s oldest pattern, YB in control and 7,339 spectators weighing an early tram home. Referee Wolfensberger had little left to decide.
Essende’s form has become the league’s quiet headline. The former Paris Saint-Germain youth player has 16 goals and three assists across his last 13 appearances, and his partnership with Fassnacht is the main reason YB have opened a season unbeaten for only the second time in the club’s history.
The shock in the Rhine valley
The result of the round came from Liechtenstein. Promoted Vaduz, given up for relegated by most in August, beat Basel 3-0 with a performance that will be debated at St. Jakob-Park for weeks. Marcel Monsberger, the 25 year old Austrian signed from Bregenz last year, scored twice before the break, his fifth and sixth goals of the season, and Lutfi Dalipi completed the scoring after 68 minutes. Even Flavius Daniliuc, who played the full match for Basel, could not slow his compatriot.
St. Gallen kept pace at the upper end with a 1-0 win over Lausanne, Lukas Görtler converting a penalty a minute after half time in a match long on yellow cards and short on chances.
The cup comes first
The league now pauses for the cup. YB face first-division Taverne next weekend, while GC begin their repair work away at interregional Grenchen, exactly the kind of fixture a new coach wants and dreads at once.
Ten rounds in, the table has a familiar shape with one unfamiliar name in it. Vaduz are nobody’s relegation certainties anymore.