The 2023/24 season marked Mitchell’s ninth with the Club, a journey that began in 2015 after initially being a part of the Sale Sharks Academy. And it proved to be the Maidstone-born back’s most successful on the Club stage – as he helped engineer Saints’ journey to the top of the Gallagher PREM table before scoring the match-winning try in the Final to see Northampton lift the Club’s first league title in a decade.
While injury hampered Mitchell’s involvement for Saints at the start of last season, a trip to Cardiff for the Investec Champions Cup Final eventually beckoned after a series of impressive performances from the scrum-half helped propel Northampton to their first European final since 2011.
For England, Mitchell has earned 23 caps to date – with over 1,000 minutes of international rugby spanning three Six Nations campaigns and a Rugby World Cup, where he became his country’s starting scrum-half as England reached the semi-finals, despite missing out on the initial squad.
And this summer Mitchell took his international career one step further when he added several coveted British & Irish Lions caps to his tally, with the tour of Australia seeing the 28-year-old named in all nine matchday squads and running out in two Test matches.
“Alex Mitchell is one of the best scrum-halves in the world, and to keep someone of his quality in our environment speaks volumes about the ambitions of this Club,” said Saints’ Director of Rugby, Phil Dowson.
“The way he plays the game, the speed that he gets the ball up, how he can identify space and then put teammates into it, his ability to open defences up by constantly challenging them, is well known.
“But we are also fortunate to see the diligence around his training, particularly his kicking game, his continued improvement in his ‘game understanding’, plus his competitive nature and coolness under pressure. To be involved in almost every game of a Lions tour is testament to that.