Goalkeeper Jak Alnwick of Cardiff City returns to his roots for a trip to Tees-Wear twice.
Goalkeeper Jak Alnwick’s family could not be more pleased that Cardiff City will make the challenging trip to the north-east of England for their upcoming two Championship games.
The Bluebirds’ next league away game is against Middlesbrough on October 3; they travel to Sunderland on Sunday.
Despite the 600-mile round trip for both, Newcastle-born Alnwick, a former Sunderland youth star, will not lack for support.
It’s great that Sunderland and Middlesbrough are on the horizon, he said.
“My father attends as many games as he can. It’s not as simple for him to come down here because it takes around six hours to get down to Cardiff.
Sunderland is no stranger to the Alnwicks. Ben, Jak’s brother and a member of the England Under-21 team, was there.
But the Cardiff stopper says his family are “full Newcastle” and he left Sunderland for the Toon academy as a teenager.
“I switched at 15, it was closer to the family home. Sunderland was a bit of a trek, my dad was working long hours and having to take me over to Sunderland. It was more of a family decision to be honest.”
- Keeper Alnwick to stay at Cardiff until 2025
- Cardiff boss Bulut no ‘prophet’ of success
Alnwick, 30, has established himself as first-choice Cardiff keeper ahead of Arsenal loanee Runar Runarsson this term and has had few better spells than the last week.
The 2-0 derby win over Swansea City last weekend was followed by the announcement of him signing a new contract to keep him at the club until 2025. Then Alnwick played as Cardiff won 3-2 at home to Coventry City on Tuesday.
He said: “Its been a bit of a whirlwind. Obviously first the derby win and then the contract comes next. It wasn’t just a spur of the moment thing, I had been in the process.
“But it was nice to tee the derby win up, sign the contract and then get a big midweek win. It’s been a brilliant few days for myself and the club.
“I had no hesitation (on the contract), not even a second thought. As soon as it was being discussed I said to my agent, ‘let’s get it done straight away’.
“I knew it was somewhere I wanted to be, I knew the vision of the club, the club is moving forward. You can see with the summer signings we want to push forward and its something I wanted to be part of.”
Alnwick feels the arrivals of players such as Wales captain Aaron Ramsey and Nottingham Forest loanee Josh Bowler mean the squad is in the best shape since he joined from St Mirren in 2022.
He particularly revelled in the win over Swansea, celebrating excitedly in front of the travelling fans, as Cardiff ended a run of four successive league defeats at the hands of their bitter rivals.
He said: “It’s a tough one. We have seen them celebrate a lot over the last couple of years so I think when you win you have to enjoy it, because at the end of the day it’s a rivalry.
“As we saw last season they had 30 people running across the pitch in front of our fans, so I thought I would have a bit of fun as well.
“Now I am going up to Sunderland. I have played a couple of times there since I left Newcastle but with each game it doesn’t matter what team I am playing against. I am fully focussed, it doesn’t matter who is the opponent.”
He is aware the Sunderland fans will know all about his Newcastle connections but he said: “It’s the same focus.
“If you get yourself too involved in those sort of games it can have a reverse effect. So it will be head down and perform. If I can make saves for the team it will be the same thing – three points. That’s what we are going for.”
