Having Deadpool star Ryan Reynolds as a co-owner means the world to an obscure Welsh town and its soccer club,
Reynolds, McElhenney buy oldest soccer club in Wales, and embrace a forgotten town
The three cases arrived at the pub door with a short, printed note on a folded sheet of white paper. “To the folks at Saith Seren: Some for you and some for me. Hopefully see you soon.” It was signed “Ryan Reynolds.”
Each case contained six bottles of Aviation Gin, a spirit that Reynolds invested in two years ago, invigorated and sold to drinks giants Diageo for more than $600 million (U.S.). So, on this Wednesday evening, in this community pub in the market town of Wrexham in the northeast of Wales, Aviation seemed the fitting tipple to toast Reynolds’ newest investment.
Forty eight hours earlier, the Vancouver native and silver screen superhero had, along with close friend and fellow actor Rob McElhenney, completed their takeover of Wrexham Association Football Club, the third oldest professional soccer team in the world, the oldest in Wales, the beating heart of this town and yet an entity completely unheard of outside the British Isles.
For all those ancient credentials, much of Wrexham’s modern history has charted struggles and strife, a force fading to something, well, forgettable … and duly forgotten. The town, like so many British coal-mining communities that struggled to fully move on once the pits closed, felt a little forgotten, too. Until Hollywood came calling. “We were looking at these bottles of gin and saying, ‘Wow, you know, I really can’t believe this is happening,’ ” Carrie Harper, a county councillor and club diehard told the Star. “Then Chris, who is the chairman of the board of Saith Seren, says, ‘Wow! Ryan Reynolds has just followed us on Twitter!’ And then Ryan replies to me asking to save him a drink. You would say this doesn’t happen every day. But in Wrexham … it is happening every day.
“It’s more than just investing in a football club, it’s about being seen, feeling seen. The whole anthem for the club is “Yma o Hyd — We’re Still Here” … through it all. Because we’ve had tough times. The club and the town have had really tough times and now, all of a sudden, we really feel like we’re on the up.”
The Reynolds and McElhenney charm offensive began in early November, as a vote on their proposed takeover approached. Once the Wrexham Supporters Trust, a fan coalition that rescued the club from the brink of extinction in 2011, overwhelmingly approved the bid last week the duo raised it another notch.
The pair have cut a sarcastic promo for the club’s sponsors, a local trailer company that specializes in horseboxes.
Reynolds dispatched gin not just to Saith Seren, a non-profit bar and Welsh language cultural centre, but also to The Turf, a more traditional boozer and matchday haunt next door to the club’s ground.
McElhenney, the mind behind smash
“The club and the town have had really tough times and now, all of a sudden, we really feel like we’re on the up.”
CARRIE HARPER
WREXHAM COUNCILLOR
U.S. sitcom “It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia,” spotted a GoFundMe arranged for a Wrexham supporter who has cerebral palsy, raising money for a specialist disability bath, and immediately pledged the full £6,000 (about $10,000). Goodwill gestures abound. But speaking to locals over the past week, it’s clear that the PR push, while endearing and welcome, was nonetheless largely unnecessary. From Wrexham’s perspective, the Hollywood duo had them at hello.
“It’s just the recognition, isn’t it?” Harper says. “That is priceless. To have people of Ryan and Rob’s stature to have looked at Wrexham and thought, ‘This is worth my time, my energy; these people are worth our time and energy,’ people are taking that to heart.”
Sitting just 10 kilometres from the border with England, Wrexham is a fiercely proud place. Proud foremost of its Welsh identity. What does it mean to be Welsh? It means you’re not English, for a start. But the causes for pride have dimmed of late.
The club’s stagnation has gone on for some time. Long enough that their home, the Racecourse Ground, sitting on Mold Road seems particularly apt. The weather can be damp, too, drizzle such a common backdrop that fans felt the need to warn Reynolds. He insisted his Vancouver upbringing has prepared him for the clouds.
Social and economic problems have long been in the daily forecast locally, too, issues only exacerbated by Brexit and the COVID pandemic.
Harper is well-placed to see that. So too is Josh Smith. As Wrexham’s club chaplain, he visits training once a week and offers a listening ear to players and staff who don’t benefit from the suite of sport psychologists and analysts that giants across the border like Liverpool and Manchester United have. In his work in the diocese and at the Tin Can Youth Centre, he has seen how unemployment, crime and social isolation have affected community morale.
“I imagine if you just Google Wrexham a lot of the first news stories that pop up may not be the most positive things. It’s a town that’s had its struggles,” Smith tells the Star.
“It’s got high levels of child poverty. Crime and drugs can be an issue. The town centre itself is struggling with empty shops. But the fact that these two Hollywood stars have chosen Wrexham — the town as much as the football club — to invest in, that means something.
“I’m hoping that the young
people that I work with can look at that and realize that actually they don’t just not matter. They do. Wrexham as a town matters and, if the club starts doing well and the town starts driving on and up again, they can be proud to be from Wrexham.”
Driving the club forward first will be no small task. Wrexham is in the National Conference, four divisions below the brightest lights of the English Premier League.
The initial feel-good effect has helped the team, with three victories in just a week. But only one club gets promoted into the next division each year and the new North American owners will soon find that the enduring charm of the lower reaches of English football is also its most constant threat — weekly forays into small but intimidating, confounding citadels where chips are permanently affixed to shoulders. Little glamour. Lots of graft and grit.
Reynolds is 44 now and while his star turn as Marvel’s Deadpool has cemented his status as Hollywood’s leading actioncomedy man, he has spread out into interests away from the screen.
He was an early devotee of his local MLS outfit, Vancouver Whitecaps. Now he and McElhenney have a club of their own. They were handed control on the back of a pledge to invest £2 million (almost $3.5 million) right away. It will likely take every penny of that and a fair few more to get Wrexham near their previous heights of the second tier in 1979.
It’s not quite the equivalent of the Toronto Maple Leafs being taken over by Welsh crooner Tom Jones, then. Although that is a particularly delightful Celtic-Canadian crossover to imagine …
Leafs GM Kyle Dubas pokes his head through the door of the owners’ office.
‘Mr Jones, I’m … uh … afraid
we’ve imploded in the playoffs against the Boston Bruins.’
“Oh dear. Is that a common occurrence?”
‘Well … it’s not unusual.’
Of all his qualities — superhero yet super-accessible, Sexiest Man Alive yet most self-deprecating — it’s a dry, droll, yes almost British sense of humour that will serve Reynolds well in north Wales. Canadian blowins have been rare visitors to the place, but the club’s history does include one Canadian international. The local wit left a lasting impression.
“It was such a fond time for me,” says Don Ferguson, a goalkeeper who made just 20 appearances in the 1985-86 season but took a lifetime of memories from the place. “I always look at their results every weekend right up to today. A few of the players would drive me around the valleys, it was a beautiful part of the world, the countryside. Football is part of the fabric of the place.”
Ferguson won 10 senior caps for the Canadian national team and is now goalkeeping coach at the University of Guelph. He hasn’t been back to Wrexham since his whirlwind time there. With a fellow countryman at the helm, he now has few excuses. “I have two boys, a 24- and 21-year-old, and they’ve heard all these stories about my time there. I really want to bring them back. It would be a nice way to go back now, with a Canadian owner in the boardroom.
“I’ve always loved his movies. He’s got a dry humour that’s going to help him a lot in terms of acclimatizing there. He’s going to have a hell of a lot of fun.”
If Canadians have been scarce in Wrexham, they’ve been almost non-existent in the boardrooms of European football. Chasing huge TV revenues, foreign ownership of elite clubs has grown at a frenzied pace, particularly in Britain. U.S. owners have bought in in a big way — eight EPL clubs have American investment.
Yet Canadians have so rarely followed suit. The Saputo family who own the Montreal Impact were very much outliers when they bought Italian top flight outfit Bologna six years ago. In fact, from the EPL all the way down to Reynolds and Wrexham in the fifth tier, there is just one other Canadian ownership group.
Dr. Jason Neale and R. Stewart Thompson bought a 50-percent stake in third-tier Peterborough United almost three years ago through their Kelgary Sports and Entertainment group. It’s been an adventure. One that they’re slightly surprised more Canadians haven’t taken on.
“Obviously hockey is the national sport of Canada so there’s a lot of emphasis on that. So, naturally, if people have sufficient capacity to purchase a sports team, they’re probably going to focus on a hockey team and go from there (to other sports),” Neale, a prolific entrepreneur and investor, says from his home in Kelowna, B.C. “It’s not obviously accessible either. How do you get involved with a football team? It’s not like you’re popping down to the supermarket.”
Neale is glad to have company in the shape of Reynolds but says he has his work cut out for him.
“I’m not surprised that he’s decided to get into football. It is a hell of a lot of fun. There aren’t
many businesses where your fate is heavily linked to events that you don’t control.
“I’m a little surprised they’ve gone non-league. I think it’s difficult to understand just how challenging it is to move up in the league system until you have to do it. But the more diverse the ownership, the better. It’s great to have another Canadian owner. If Wrexham are drawn against us in the cup, we’ll welcome them with open arms.”
This isn’t just about the adventure of course. Reynolds and McElhenny have already confirmed that their ownership journey will be the subject of a documentary. According to a report in Bloomberg, they could make about $500,000 (U.S.) an episode as the sportsas-content-fodder trend ramps up. The word that Harper has heard on the street is they may already be reaping some of their investment with club merchandise getting hot.
“They usually sell about 25 ( jerseys) a day in the shop,” she says. “And it’s hundreds now, with a lot from the U.S. apparently.”
Neale has two pieces of sage advice for Reynolds. The first: “run it like a business. Otherwise it’s just going to be an amazing opportunity to lose vast sums of money.” Reynolds has shown quite a knack for business success already.
The second, however — to try to “have a separation” with fans, avoiding too much of an emotional attachment — may prove an impossible proposition.
“It’s obviously great when Ryan Reynolds tweets us back,” laughs Harper. “But imagine when they finally come over here and are in the stadium and in the town. It will be wild.”
Forgotten no more, the people of Wrexham aren’t interested in separation. They’re smitten. And that’s not just the gin talking.
“The fact that these two Hollywood stars have chosen Wrexham — the town as much as the football club — to invest in, that means something.” JOSH SMITH
WREXHAM CHAPLAIN