Basel on mission improbable to Munich

FC Basel 1893 visit Group E winners FC Bayern München hoping to turn their slim prospects of UEFA Champions League progress into an unlikely looking success story.

• The Swiss titleholders enter their final group fixture three points behind second-placed AS Roma. To overtake the Italian team, they not only need to beat a Bayern side who have won their last six European home games, but also require Roma to lose at CFR 1907 Cluj.

• Bayern won 2-1 with a late Bastian Schweinsteiger goal when the clubs met in Switzerland on Matchday 2 and visiting coach Thorsten Fink will know the size of Basel's task better than anyone having spent six seasons in Bayern's first-team squad as a player.

• If Basel fail to pull off their mission improbable they can take consolation from having already guaranteed third place, and UEFA Europa League entry, after beating CFR last time out.

Previous meetings
• Although the teams had not met in UEFA competition before September, Bayern did face a Basel XI in the 1962/63 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup first round. Bayern won 3-0 in Switzerland and advanced after the second leg was not played.

• Bayern prevailed 3-1 at Basel in a friendly in January this year, Hamit Altıntop and Miroslav Klose (2) overturning Marco Streller's first-half strike.

Match background
• Bayern are seeking a seventh straight UEFA Champions League home victory against opponents who have three wins from four away games in this season's competition, qualifying included.

• Basel have won once in four attempts on German soil, 1-0 at Hamburger SV in the 1999 UEFA Intertoto Cup third round, George Koumantarakis scoring. A 3-2 second-leg home reverse left them eliminated, however. Their last visit to Germany was a 1-1 draw at Hamburg in the 2007/08 UEFA Cup group stage, Ivica Olić scoring for the hosts.

• Bayern's only previous encounter with Swiss opposition in UEFA competition was against Neuchâtel Xamax FC in the 1987/88 European Champion Clubs' Cup second round. They lost the first leg 2-1 – Lothar Matthäus scoring an away goal – and in the return needed late efforts from Hans Pflügler (87) and Jürgen Wegmann (90) to progress.

Team ties
• Basel coach Fink won three Bundesliga titles with Bayern between 1997 and 2003. He was an 80th-minute substitute in the 1999 UEFA Champions League final loss to Manchester United FC but was not in the party for the 2001 final victory against Valencia CF.

• Bayern coach Louis van Gaal has faced another Swiss outfit, Grasshopper-Club, six times. As AFC Ajax coach he met them in the 1995/96 and 1996/97 UEFA Champions League group stages, recording a home win and away draw first time round, then a home defeat and away win.

• While at AZ Alkmaar, Van Gaal faced Grasshoppers in the 2005/06 and 2006/07 UEFA Cup group stages – a 1-0 home win and a 5-2 away success respectively.

• Klose scored SV Werder Bremen's goal in a 2-1 loss in Basel in the 2005/06 UEFA Champions League third qualifying round and also played in Bremen's 3-0 home victory in the return.

• Alexander Frei played for Borussia Dortmund between 2006 and 2009, appearing in their 2-1 German Cup final defeat by Bayern in 2008.

• Çağdaş Atan spent 2008/09 with FC Energie Cottbus.

• Mario Gomez scored Germany's second goal in a 3-1 friendly win against Switzerland in February 2007. Philipp Lahm and Schweinsteiger also played while Streller got Switzerland's goal.

• Gomez struck twice more with Klose also on target when a Germany side also including Lahm and Schweinsteiger beat Switzerland 4-0 in another friendly in March 2008. Frei and Benjamin Huggel were on the losing home side.

• Gomez, Schweinsteiger and substitute Toni Kroos appeared in Germany's goalless draw with a Sweden side including Behrang Safari in a Gothenburg friendly on 17 November. The previous month Safari had featured in the Swedes' 4-1 UEFA EURO 2012 qualifying loss to Mark van Bommel's Netherlands.

• Scott Chipperfield was in the Australia team beaten 4-0 by Germany at the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Klose and Thomas Müller were among Germany's scorers.