The Fussball Club Basel 1893 1989–90 season was their 96th season since the club's foundation. Charles Röthlisberger was the club's chairman for the second consecutive year. FC Basel played their home games in the St. Jakob Stadium. Following their relegation in the 1987–88 season this was their second season in the second tier of Swiss football. Overview Pre-season For the third consecutive season Urs Siegenthaler was first team coach. After missing promotion the season before the club's repeated priority aim was to return to the top flight of Swiss football. Due to the poor results during October Urs Siegenthaler lost his position as first team coach and in November he was replaced by Ernst August Künnecke. As was previously noted during the off-season period over the previous few years, again this season there were many changes in the squad. Remo Brügger, who had recovered from his car accident injuries, moved on to St. Gallen. This was in a player swop with goalkeeper pendant Thomas Grüter who did not want to return there, following his six-month loan with Basel, following Brügger's accident. Michael Syfrig moved on to higher tier Aarau and Lucio Esposito also moved on to a higher-tier club, Bellinzona. Seven other players left the squad because their contracts had not been renewed. In the other direction Erni Maissen returned from Young Boys. Ruedi Zbinden returned to the club and Sascha Reich signed in from Bellinzona. Miodrag Đurđević was taken on contrcat from Dinamo Zagreb and Uwe Wassmer from Schalke 04. Further there were the signings of young local newcomers, like Manfred Wagner from FC Steinen-Höllstein, Vittorio Gottardi from SC Dornach, Jörg Heuting from Concordia Basel and René Spicher from Old Boys. Other newcomers were Olaf Berg from Viktoria Buchholz and Boris Mancastroppa from Red Star Zürich. Domestic league The 24 teams in the Nationalliga B were divided into two groups, an east and a west group, to first play a qualification round. In the second stage the tops six teams in each group and the last four team of the Nationalliga A would play a promotion/relegation round, also divided into two groups. The top two teams in each group would play in the top flight the next season. Basel were assigned to the West group. The Qualifying Phase started well and after ten rounds with six victories and only one defeat Basel led the group. Then however, a run