Associated Press<\/p>\n
THUN, Switzerland<\/a> (AP) \u2014 Swiss champion Thun sold two more players Monday from its surprise title-winning team in a tough start to the season that included a quick exit from the Champions League<\/a>.<\/p>\n Thun said defender Michael Heule<\/a> joined Heidenheim in Germany<\/a> and midfielder Valmir Matoshi<\/a> went to Sturm Graz, the Austrian club that is in the Europa<\/a> league this season.<\/p>\n Thun reportedly will receive 3.75 million euros ($4.4 million) in combined transfer fees for the pair, who each played more than 30 league games last season as the newly promoted team stunningly eased to its first Swiss title.<\/p>\n In the first home game of its title defense, Thun lost 6-0 to Young Boys and it was 7-0 to Lech Poznan<\/a> last week in the first leg of a Europa League qualifying playoff. If Thun is eliminated after the return game Thursday it will play in the third-tier Conference League starting Oct. 15.<\/p>\n Thun began its season in Champions League qualifying rounds in July but was eliminated by Dinamo Zagreb<\/a>. Thun held a two-goal lead deep into the second leg before defender Marco Burki<\/a> was sent off.<\/p>\n Success last season drew attention from richer rivals and Thun coach Mauro Lustrinelli went to Union Berlin, top prospect Ethan Meichtry joined Genoa, then leading scorers Elmin Rastoder<\/a> and Christopher Ibayi<\/a> left for, respectively, Panathinaikos and Moroccan club MAS.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n See AP\u2019s full soccer coverage here<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Associated Press THUN, Switzerland (AP) \u2014 Swiss champion Thun sold two more players Monday from its surprise title-winning…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":119881,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[58481,58494,58493,1344,44519,58495,58479,17,58492,3259],"class_list":["post-119880","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-switzerland","tag-christopher-ibayi","tag-dinamo-zagreb","tag-elmin-rastoder","tag-germany","tag-lech-poznan","tag-marco-burki","tag-michael-heule","tag-switzerland","tag-uefa-champions-league","tag-valmir-matoshi"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/117151653306313123","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119880","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119880"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119880\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119881"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}