Alexander Walke (born 6 June 1983) is a German former professional football

goalkeeper In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting o ...

Club career

Born in

Oranienburg Oranienburg () is a town in Brandenburg, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Oberhavel. Geography Oranienburg is a town located on the banks of the Havel river, 35 km north of the centre of Berlin. Division of the town Oranienburg ...

Brandenburg Brandenburg (; nds, Brannenborg; dsb, Bramborska ) is a state in the northeast of Germany bordering the states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony, as well as the country of Poland. With an area of 29,480 sq ...

, Walke began his career at

Energie Cottbus FC Energie Cottbus ( Lower Sorbian: ''Energija Chóśebuz'') is a German football club based in Cottbus, Brandenburg. It was founded in 1963 as SC Cottbus in what was East Germany. After the reunification of Germany, Energie played six seasons i ...

as a 14-year-old. In 1999, he transferred to

Werder Bremen Sportverein Werder Bremen von 1899 e. V. (), commonly known as Werder Bremen (), Werder or simply Bremen, is a German professional sports club based in Bremen, Free Hanseatic City of Bremen. Founded on 4 February 1899, they are best known for the ...

, and was called up to the professional team in 2003. After six years, Walke moved to

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg (; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a ...

in 2005 from Werder Bremen to join

SC Freiburg Sport-Club Freiburg e.V., commonly known as SC Freiburg () or just Freiburg, is a German football club, based in the city of Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg. It plays in the Bundesliga, having been promoted as champions from the 2. Bund ...

. In 2008, he transferred to SV Wehen Wiesbaden. Walke left SV Wehen Wiesbaden to the end of the 2008–09 season. On 28 May 2009, he signed a two-year contract with

FC Hansa Rostock FC Hansa Rostock () is a German association football club based in the city of Rostock, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The club is also called as "the cog" because of its club crest. They have emerged as one of the most successful clubs from the forme ...

where he played in all 36 games. In 2010, Walke left Germany to sign for Austrian Bundesliga champion FC Red Bull Salzburg. He was the third German-born goalkeeper for the 2010–2011 season behind

Niclas Heimann Niclas Heimann (born 12 March 1991) is a German professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Regionalliga Südwest club SGV Freiberg. With Rot-Weiss Essen Heimann won the Lower Rhine Cup The Lower Rhine Cup (German: ''Niederrheinpokal ...

and

Gerhard Tremmel Gerhard Martin "Gerry" Tremmel (born 16 November 1978) is a German former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. He works as a scout for Swansea City. Tremmel played in the Premier League, Bundesliga, UEFA Champions League and UEFA ...

. After one year on loan at Greuther Fürth in the

2. Bundesliga The 2. Bundesliga ( ) is the second division of professional football in Germany. It was implemented 11 years after the founding of the Fußball-Bundesliga as the new second division for professional football. The 2. Bundesliga is ranked below ...

he returned to Salzburg for the 2011–12 season taking over the number 1 position from

Eddie Gustafsson Douglas Edward Alexander "Eddie" Gustafsson McIntosh (born 31 January 1977) is a Swedish former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. Starting off his career with IFK Stockholm in 1993, he went on to play professionally in Norway f ...

. During the 2017-18 season Salzburg had their best ever European campaign. They finished top of their Europa League group, for a record fourth time, before beating Real Sociedad and

Borussia Dortmund Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e. V. Dortmund, commonly known as Borussia Dortmund (), BVB (), or simply Dortmund (), is a German professional sports club based in Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is best known for its men's professional fo ...

thus making their first ever appearance in the UEFA Europa League semi-final. On 3 May 2018, he played in the Europa League semi-finals as Olympique de Marseille played out a 1–2 away loss but a 3–2 aggregate win to secure a place in the

2018 UEFA Europa League Final The 2018 UEFA Europa League Final was the final match of the 2017–18 UEFA Europa League, the 47th season of Europe's secondary club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 9th season since it was renamed from the UEFA Cup to the UEFA Eu ...

. He retired in 2023 as a legend of Red Bull Salzburg, and will stay on as a youth goalkeeping coach.

International career

He competed for Germany at the FIFA World Youth Championship 2003, but tested positive for

tetrahydrocannabinol Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is the principal psychoactive constituent of cannabis and one of at least 113 total cannabinoids identified on the plant. Although the chemical formula for THC (C21H30O2) describes multiple isomers, the term ''THC' ...

, the active chemical in marijuana.

Career statistics

Honours

Red Bull Salzburg * Austrian Bundesliga: 2011–12, 2013–14, 2014–15, 2015–16, 2016–17, 2017–18, 2018–19, 2019–20,

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

, 2021–22, 2022-2023 * Austrian Cup: 2011–12, 2013–14, 2014–15, 2015–16, 2016–17, 2018–19, 2019–20,

, 2021–22

References

External links