A Hollywood story demands a Hollywood ending. A Wrexham story is not quite so pre-ordained, but this? In a script even more implausible than Deadpool 2, which starred Wrexham co-owner Ryan Reynolds, his club were two goals to the good against relegated Dover Athletic. Then they shipped five to a team who have still not reached zero after points deductions. And finally, magically, amazingly, 2-5 became 6-5. These are astonishing times for little Wrexham, but this was the most astonishing time of all.
In the 14 years of hurt since they slipped out of the Football League, even a second-placed Conference finish in 2011-12 couldn’t prise them back in. Those golden days of Micky Thomas’s free kick bamboozling Arsenal’s David Seaman 20 years ago and those European nights when Hajduk Split and Porto fell at the Racecourse seem almost folk memories now.
Enter Reynolds and Rob McElhenney. You may remember Reynolds from such films as National Lampoon’s Van Wilder and Deadpool. He was the world’s second-highest paid actor (behind Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson) in 2020 and so tightly bound to American entertainment’s inner circle that fellow Canadian Alanis Morissette wrote a song about him. Taylor Swift has written a song about his daughter — of course she has. McElhenney, meanwhile, was the brains behind It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, a hit Netflix comedy. Last February, the pair’s RR McReynolds Company purchased Wrexham and invested £2 million into the rickety underachieving old warhorse.
Money-spinning investments in Aviation gin and the telecommuncations company Stack Mobile suggests Reynolds has a business eye which often eludes both Hollywood A listers and owners of English fifth-tier football clubs.
A year since they arrived, the stats tell some of the tale. Over 100,000 people follow them on TikTok and the social media behemoth is also the club’s shirt sponsor. Almost 17 per cent of their Instagram following are based in the United States and there is an American film team making a fly-on-the-wall documentary, Welcome To Wrexham.
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The Racecourse will remain their home, but the disused Kop End will be redeveloped. Season ticket sales for more than doubled from 2609 to 5892; shirts from 2896 to over 14,000 and attendances have soared to levels unseen since Arfon Griffiths held midfield sway.
Behind the scenes there is more. McReyolds purchased a battalion of powerchairs to increase wheelchair users’ participation in sport and their newly financed under-19s women’s team have won their league in their inaugural season.
As glamorous new owners tend to do, McReynolds promised to relink the club to a community who were longer interested. Their first major recruit was CEO Fleur Robinson, fresh from 26 years as Burton Albion’s commercial director, during which they rose from the sixth tier to the Championship. Her remit, she explains, was to merge the upsurge in interest brought by the new owners with a reforging of community links.
“The owners are involved as much and as little as they want to be,” she explains. “I’m free to do my job how I think best. The aim to get back into the Football League is clear. I hope we’ll be there next year, but it doesn’t happen overnight.”
Phil Parkinson arrived in the summer to find just 12 players to manage. “We had to spend, just to catch up,” he insists. “There wasn’t enough quality.” Last year’s League Two top scorer, 31-goal Paul Mullin was tempted to north Wales and when goalkeeper Rob Lainton’s season ended when he broke his wrist at Bromley last week, Lee Camp, a Championship player two years ago, arrived, but only as far as the bench.
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Yet, even after yesterday’s sorcery, promotion is far from certain. The play-offs and an improvement on last year’s eighth place seem assured, but with only one automatic place available, they are 11 points behind leaders Stockport County, whose own budget allowed them to fly down to Eastleigh for yesterday’s game.
In sorry contrast, Dover arrived as cannon fodder. After their local owners furloughed players and staff, Dover failed to complete last season’s fixtures. They were fined £40,000 and began this season with a 12-point deduction. No lower league Derby County, Dover may yet finish this season on minus points. Yesterday, just 22 away tickets were sold.
As if to suggest Senator Joseph McCarthy had a point, initially the reds were everywhere and Wrexham were two up in 20 minutes, via Mullin and James Jones.
An avalanche beckoned. Then Dover scored five. George Wilkinson pulled one back with a spectacular curler, a reminder that luminous beauty can still appear, even in the very darkest, most dire days. The whole ground applauded. Moments after Jordan Davies had hit the bar from two yards out with the goal untended, Alfie Pavey nodded home a 28th minute corner. This time, the home crowd’s response was rather less benign.
More startling still, Dover were three ahead before the hour was up with a 12-minute hat trick courtesy of Michael Gyasi, who signed for Chelsea aged 11. First the Ghanaian lobbed Andy Dibble’s son, Christian. Then he tapped into an empty goal after some awful defending and then, unmarked, guided home at the far post.
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Like a more thrilling version of Reynolds’s Green Lantern, it wasn’t over yet. Ollie Palmer notched a quickfire brace for Wrexham. The score was 4-5 and there were still 21 minutes remaining. As the nine added minutes were announced, the mayhem began. Davies atoned for his earlier error with a smartly taken equaliser and then headed Luke Young’s corner past Adam Parkes. “I’ve never seen anything like it,” chuckled Parkinson of his team’s fairy tale. They should make a film of it.
