Walking down Wrexham high street one match day lunchtime, there was little to suggest dramatic regeneration. A fight was on the point of breaking out in the doorway of The Horse & Jockey pub. An evangelical preacher with a broken microphone was urging passers-by to realise Jesus loved them.
Only later, over a prematch pint of Wrexham Lager in the football club’s historic pub, did the resurrection of this small city in North Wales become evident. Among the excited chatter of locals, there were frequent North American twangs. And then came the cameras.
One film crew jostled in fans’ faces. Others interviewed supporters and a burger-van boss. Welcome to Wrexham, the hit Disney documentary series (now in season 5), has charted the city’s fortunes over the five years since Canadian-born film star Ryan Reynolds and fellow A-lister Rob Mc Elhenney bailed out Wrexham Association Football Club, a team that for years had languished in the lower leagues and by the time Covid hit in 2020 was struggling for survival.
For Michael Williamson, chief executive of Wrexham AFC for the past two and a half years, the story proved irresistible. The American had worked in senior roles (including CFO) at top-flight Inter Milan and then at Miami FC, but when he was headhunted by Reynolds and Mc Elhenney he was swiftly smitten by the romance of their plan. “I called my wife up and I said, ‘you know, I don’t have an offer, I have no idea what they’re willing to pay, but we’re going to North Wales, to Wrexham, if we get the chance’.”Since Rob and Ryan, as they are universally known here, acquired the club from the Wrexham Supporters Trust for £2mn in 2021, it has become a fairytale success story. The world’s third-oldest professional football club was promoted from the lowly National League to League Two, League One and then the Championship in three successive seasons.
A few months ago, it narrowly missed out on a final potential promotion to the top-flight Premier League. “That really stung because I felt we were so close,” says Williamson, in an interview overlooking the Cae Ras (Welsh for racecourse) ground. Even so, the repeat league promotions, an expanded list of sponsors and a fast-growing fan base — all turbocharged by the global brand-building of Welcome to Wrexham (and its nearly 5mn regular viewers) — have transformed the club in all senses. There have been two significant capital raisings since the 2020 acquisition.
The first was backed by the Allyn family (New York entrepreneurs and philanthropists best known for founding, then selling, the Welch Allyn medical equipment group). The second, which brought in private equity group Apollo (whose other European football asset is the rather larger Atlético Madrid), reportedly valued Wrexham at close to $500mn. For Reynolds and Mc Elhenney, who retain close to 75 per cent of the club, that sounds like a phenomenal financial return.
But Williamson points to the vast outlays of cash — the £69mn cost to expand fan capacity at the Cae Ras from barely 10,000 to 18,000, a net €39mn (£33mn) spent on new players over the summer, £7mn on a training pavilion and nearly £2mn on a new pitch. The last published accounts show the club made a £15mn operating loss on £33mn of revenue in the year to June 2025. Shopping lists in big-time football get pricey.
Williamson, who would not comment on last week’s ruling that found Manchester City guilty of serious breaches of financial rules, says moneymaking is not the principal aim. “I always joke that if you want to make a billionaire a millionaire, tell them to buy a football club.”Either way, he has been astonished by the enthusiasm Reynolds and Mc Elhenney have shown for the Wrexham project. “Their passion and their commitment are remarkable,” he says. “But they aren’t ...
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