Chris Coleman will return to a familiar setting on Saturday, as Sunderland travel to Cardiff City to face Neil Warnock’s high-flying Bluebirds.
The Sunderland manager guided Wales to their first international tournament in 58 years during an unforgettable tenure, but before the rain-soaked elation in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the titanic win over Belgium at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy, Coleman built the foundations for success at the Cardiff City Stadium.
18 months on from Euro 2016, the Welshman is once again building from the bottom as he aims to steer Sunderland out of the bottom three and back to winning ways following successive defeats.
And speaking to safc.com, he urged his players to produce a performance and conquer the Welsh capital.
“I know the stadium like the back of my hand and I spent a lot of time there.
“It will be nice to go back but we’re up against a good team and Cardiff aren’t stupid, so they won’t be looking at us as an easy 90 minutes, especially if we’re as good as we can be.
“That’s what we have to try and produce and if we can do that we can come back with a good result, that’s for sure.
“I don’t know [what kind of reception I’ll get], I’m a Swansea boy going back to Cardiff,” continued the Welshman with a smile.
“All my memories in the stadium are obviously very, very positive, so I’ve got to make sure that doesn’t change when I’m leaving and getting on the bus to come back up here.
“I want to make sure there’s another positive memory for us in terms of the performance and the result.
“We slipped up against Barnsley which was really disappointing, but we can’t dwell on that because the points are so important for us and it really is just a case of marching onto the next challenge.”