WREXHAM, Wales (AP) — No trips to Old Trafford or Anfield. There will be no visits from Erling Haaland or Bukayo Saka.
For Wrexham and its growing number of fans around the world, the dream of playing in the Premier League next season – of back-to-back promotions. That’s all.
And there was a deep sense of disappointment inside the Racecourse grounds on Saturday, when Wrexham were knocked out of the play-offs after a 2-2 draw with Middlesbrough on the final day of the Championship season. The players collapsed to the ground, clearly disappointed. One person covered his face with his hands.
But there was also pride among the supporters, who gave their team a standing ovation. Many of them would have been there 20 years ago, when Wrexham was held hostage by the actions of unscrupulous owners and on the brink of financial collapse, until they banded together to save it from going out of business.
Wrexham have now just achieved their best ever finish in their 162-year history – seventh place in English football’s second tier – and the club’s ambitions remain high. Celebrity owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob Mack.
“The standard has been set,” Wrexham defender Dom Higham said. “And I hope to do even better next season.”
In fact, once the pain of missing out on promotion wears off, some fans may consider staying in the Championship a blessing in disguise.
“I think we still need a few more seasons in this league,” long-time Wrexham fan David Morris told the Associated Press at a match at the Racecourse last month.
“I think we went too fast.”
Here, a once down-on-their-luck Welsh club came out of nowhere. One of the most talked about soccer teams in the world.
racetrack
If you go to the racecourse (also known as STōK Cae Ras, using the club’s preferred Welsh name), you’ll immediately be greeted by the sight of cranes, excavators and giant concrete blocks on a construction site behind one of the stadium’s goals.
Team officials say the redevelopment of the Kop stand — a promise made in Reynolds and Mack’s mission statement when they bought the club in 2021 — is expected to begin in 2025 and be completed in early 2027, and is expected to accommodate an additional 7,500 fans.
This will increase capacity to a maximum of 18,000 seats, restore the racecourse to four sides and bring the stadium into compliance with the UEFA category allowing it to host international matches.
“Kop is a big thing,” Morris said. “So you can’t go to the Premier League and just have 10,000 fans[for home games]because it’s not right.
“We’re going to have to spend more money on the players and we’re going to need the fans to help us generate the money.”
tv show
The Emmy Award-winning television series Welcome to Wrexham, which chronicled Reynolds and Mack’s first foray into football ownership, has been a major driver of the club’s rise to prominence. This show already has four series.
Season 5 begins this month, and Reynolds announced on Instagram that it has been renewed for three more seasons.
Geir Ludwig Mäland, 49, from the Norwegian town of Haugesund, watched the match between Wrexham and Stoke with friends last month and said the TV show was what drew him to the club and its journey to promotion.
After a drink at the Turf Pub, next to the racecourse, he summed up his first experience in Wrexham: “Very nice people, very charming and welcoming.”
Maeland also said Wrexham would benefit from another year of playing in the Championship.
“If they go up to the Premier League, they’ll go right back down,” he said. “They need more experience.”
manager
Wrexham’s unprecedented run of three successive promotions saw them climb out of the fifth-tier National League and into the Championship, under the direction of manager Phil Parkinson.
Any doubts about whether Parkinson, who has never managed a Premier League club, could take Wrexham any further have been dispelled by the team’s best ever performance.
Mack recently said Parkinson “got the job of a lifetime.”
“Ryan and I talk all the time,” he said in an interview with The Athletic, “I can’t think of a scenario where Phil Parkinson gets fired. It makes no sense.”
players
Wrexham spent around $40 million on 13 new players last summer, the highest ever in a single transfer window under Reynolds and Mack, and was no doubt boosted by the club getting external financial investment. The Allyn family is based in New York. and private equity firms Apollo Sports Capital In the last two years.
Wrexham are expected to spend big again, with Morris looking for a centre-back, two midfielders and a striker who is “able to do it himself rather than be fed”.
Speaking after the Middlesbrough game, Parkinson said he had no doubt more players would join over the summer.
“We know where we want to strengthen and what we need to improve,” he said. “We’re going to do that and make this team as strong as possible for next year’s challenge.”
championship
This league is notoriously difficult to break out of, and some might say it’s the most difficult, with many clubs coveting a piece of the Premier League’s riches, but if Tottenham can’t avoid relegation, one of England’s biggest teams could remain next season.
The Championship is sure to feature another ambitious American-owned club. birmingham citywhile Wolverhampton and burnley Their relegation from the top flight, already confirmed, will be supported by tens of millions of dollars in parachute payments from the Premier League over the next three seasons.
The changes for next season’s Championship include the addition of two play-off spots and a drop to eighth in the table to improve Wrexham’s chances of promotion.
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