Wrexham are less than a month away from starting the Championship campaign with a trip to Southampton.
This summer has provided even more pinch-me moments after Wrexham secured a third-straight promotion.
Wrexham face Southampton on the opening day of the Championship season, a league meeting that few could have expected to see just a few years ago.
Wrexham have also jetted off on another pre-season tour, this time heading to Australia and New Zealand.
Rob McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds overlooked the United States this time, but the Wrexham buzz has made its way Down Under.
Wrexham continue to make huge strides both on and off the pitch, and that surely won’t come to an end any time soon.
Photo by Robbie Jay Barratt – AMA/Getty ImagesRob McElhenney on Ryan Reynolds
McElhenney and Reynolds have not only sparked major interest in Wrexham from around the world but also engaged the local community in this incredible rise.
Phil Parkinson has been the man to knit it all together, but none of this would have been possible without McElhenney and Reynolds.
The Hollywood duo purchased Wrexham for around £2million in 2021 and arrived with a goal.
McElhenney targeted the Championship inside five years when trying to sign Paul Mullin, and Wrexham have managed it in just four years.
McElhenney has now opened up on the Wrexham journey and how his original plans for Reynolds changed.
Speaking on the Dan Patrick Show, McElhenney – who now also goes by ‘Rob Mac’ – admitted that he initially wanted Reynolds to sponsor Wrexham through his company, Aviation Gin.
McElhenney slowly realised that Reynolds could take the Wrexham project to an entirely different level, and set the wheels in motion to become partners.
Now ‘horrifically addicted’ to football, McElhenney will certainly believe that he made the right decision when changing his approach to Reynolds.
“I went back and I found the original email that I sent to him, where I laid out the idea, what I wanted to do,” said McElhenney.
“Originally, I was going to do it on my own and ask Ryan if he wanted to be a sponsor, Aviation Gin as the front-of-kit sponsor.
“The more I thought about it, the more I realised… ‘wow, he’s such an entrepreneur, he’s globally famous, whatever he touches seems to turn to gold, if I could potentially include him as a partner, this could take this thing to the stratosphere’.
“I remember asking my wife about it, I said ‘Kaitlin, what do you think about me asking Ryan to be a full partner on this?’, and she said ‘I don’t know, I guess it depends on whether your ego can take sharing a screen with Ryan Reynolds’. I said ‘ehh… good point, good point’.
“We went in with our hearts on our sleeves, we said ‘we don’t know anything about football’. Honestly, I’ve become a soccer fan. I was not even a fan of the beautiful game up until five years ago, and now I’m horrifically addicted,” he added.
Wrexham won’t just settle for Championship action
McElhenney’s first major target may have been to reach the Championship, but don’t for a second believe that Wrexham will be happy to just settle at this level.
Immediately after sealing promotion, McElhenney set out his aims for more success by simply stating that Wrexham are ‘not done yet’.
Neil Warnock has assessed Wrexham’s hopes by suggesting that Premier League football could be in the club’s future.
McElhenney and Reynolds would certainly love to take Wrexham to that level, though it may take time and some significant investment.
Nothing is out of the question with Wrexham, and we are sure that there are many more exciting chapters to be written in the coming months and years.