A glance at Rob McElhenney’s office wall in Los Angeles suggests the good times have only just begun for Wrexham.
Since joining forces with Ryan Reynolds to complete probably the most unlikely takeover in British football history, there have been many moments to savour for the creator of sitcom It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia.
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Promotion back to the EFL was the big one. But there have been plenty of others to cherish, including Ben Foster’s pivotal penalty save against Notts County and reaching Wembley in the pair’s first full season at the helm.
After each of those notable successes, McElhenney would squirrel away a few blades of grass from the Racecourse Ground pitch in his pocket as a souvenir.
Now, thanks to an inspired birthday present from his wife and It’s Always Sunny… co-star Kaitlin Olson, those little keepsakes serve as a daily reminder of the huge strides Wrexham have made under their Hollywood owners and the burning desire of the acting duo to keep driving the Welsh club forward.
“As I grow older, I recognise you must take time to take a breath and enjoy what it is you’re doing,” McElhenney tells The Athletic. “If we’re not taking stock of where we are and where we’ve come (from), then what is the point?
“I’m staring right now, in my office, at a thing my wife made for me for my birthday. When I get down on the pitch, I have a tendency to take some of the grass and put it in my pocket, so I have a keep-sake of the event.
“I’d keep them in these little plastic bags and put a piece of paper inside with the occasion (written on it). She stole them from the drawer I keep them in and took them to a (picture) framer. Now they are behind this air-sealed glass. They put some kind of chemical in the grass to keep (preserve) it and then there is a little plaque underneath each one.
“There’s my first home win I saw against Maidstone. The Hand of Foz — which is the Notts County game (when goalkeeper Ben Foster made an iconic 96th-minute penalty save against Wrexham’s promotion rivals late last season). The National League title…”
Almost as if sensing the next question, McElhenney doesn’t miss a beat: “There are another eight (slots) underneath that are empty, just waiting for the next few large milestones.”
He is the first to admit owning a football club 5,000 miles from his U.S. home is not without its challenges. Not least in a financial sense, with the second series of documentary Welcome To Wrexham having made clear just how many millions were on the line for the club’s co-owners during last season’s titanic National League promotion battle with Notts County.
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The weight of carrying a whole town’s dreams can also play havoc with the emotions, as McElhenney was reminded every morning last April when looking in the mirror to see a double stye staring back.
Those stress levels only started to ease once victory over Boreham Wood confirmed Wrexham’s 15 years in the non-League wilderness was finally at an end. He relived this period during the past week when joining supporters in watching the series two finale.
“You, intellectually, know what happened,” says McElhenney. “But you emotionally, almost forget.
“With my nervous system, I still feel the anxiety from the end of the Notts County game. I’ve mentioned in one of the episodes that I had a massive double stye. You can see them in the documentary. My eyes are swollen up like I’m a prize-fighter. That was simply due to the stress.
“In watching some of the footage, I felt a lot of those things coming back, even though I knew it was a happy ending.”
September 23 this year. Wrexham have just been thrashed 5-0 by Stockport County, the club’s heaviest defeat since losing by the same margin almost a decade earlier against Luton Town.
As manager Phil Parkinson applauds the 900 away fans for their support in southern Manchester, he is hurting. Wrexham still occupy the final play-off place in League Two, but this is the third time in nine league games his side have conceded five goals.
He needs a lift.
It comes a few minutes later, via a message he discovers after turning on his phone in the dressing room. “Phil, we are right behind you,” it reads. “We are right with you.”
The sender is McElhenney, who has been following events at home in California on a live stream. “I sent that text before the final whistle,” he says. “I wanted to make sure he knew, as soon as he got back to the locker room, that we had his back.
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“It is easy to be supportive when things are great and things are all going to plan. It is easy to coast through on that, feeling the wind at your back and in your sails. But when you are going through adversity and you take a look around, you really see who your friends are.
“Everyone goes through those moments of adversity. No one’s life is a constant uptick. Those moments are important. You see who is really there for you when the chips are down.”
McElhenney and Deadpool actor Reynolds completed their purchase of Wrexham in February 2021. Since then, they have grown accustomed to the vagaries of football. How could they not when even the most creative scriptwriter would have struggled to come up with the twists Wrexham have faced while they’ve been in charge?
Some, such as that Foster penalty save against Notts County and clinching promotion against Boreham Wood despite falling behind within 44 seconds, have been genuine ‘Pinch me, I must be dreaming!’ moments for the pair.
But then there have been the lows, too.
The nadir must have been the seven days at the end of that first season when Wrexham were beaten 1-0 by Bromley at Wembley Stadium in the final of the FA Trophy (an FA Cup-style knockout competition for clubs outside the English game’s top four divisions of the Premier League and EFL), and then lost 5-4 to Grimsby Town in a single-leg National League play-off semi-final that went to extra time.
The pain of that play-offs exit is unlikely to ever go away in north Wales. That much was clear in September when Grimsby were beaten 3-0 on their first return to the Racecourse since that crazy afternoon 16 months earlier. “You can stick your 5-4 up your arse,” sang the gleeful locals.
Funnily, though, those back-to-back footballing kicks in the teeth probably helped Welcome To Wrexham more than if it had been mission accomplished for the new owners at the first attempt.
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Promotion finally being clinched last April was only added to by having shared in the disappointment of that heart-breaking setback the previous season.
Series three, commissioned just last week by U.S. broadcaster FX but this time with a spring premiere, seems likely to bring more of the same as Wrexham’s return to the EFL has proved anything but smooth. During the campaign’s opening weeks, the serious injury suffered by Paul Mullin in a match on the pre-season tour of the U.S. cast a shadow over proceedings.
“The beginning of the season did not go to plan,” adds McElhenney, whose club now sit fourth in League Two, out of the automatic promotion places on goal difference, after Saturday’s 2-0 away loss against Accrington Stanley. “Not when you have your superstar striker, who the team is built around, suffers a punctured lung and broken ribs, meaning he can’t leave the United States and see his family.
“That was a very big moment of adversity for Paul, most importantly, and his family. But also the club. We then wind up back at the Racecourse (for the opening game against MK Dons). Let the coronation begin. And we get absolutely thumped (a 5-3 defeat)! I’m pretty sure the first episode will be titled something like, ‘Welcome to the EFL, be careful what you wish for…’.
“But that is what is so compelling about sport. It is a living organism. There is no end. There was a beginning; that was in 1864 (when Wrexham were formed), so we are right in the middle of the story. We believe we are just a new chapter in the beginning of something great. But what will make season three so compelling is you don’t know how we are going to fare.”
Also likely to once again draw in the viewers at the start of that third series is the wider Wrexham community; the people who have, with all due respect to the owners, been the real stars of the show. Whether it’s Wayne Jones, the amiable landlord of The Turf pub, or the club’s disability liaison officer Kerry Evans, their stories have formed a compelling part of the narrative.
McElhenney and Reynolds are big on community. That much has been clear since their arrival.
Just last week, the pair donated £3,500 to a town-centre shop owner whose stock was ransacked during a burglary. Steve Tapp, owner of Wrexham Trainer Revival, credits them with saving his business.
@RMcElhenney and @VancityReynolds have literally saved my business and I’ll be forever grateful. If you only knew what that donation has meant to my life…❤️❤️🏴
— ‘Tappy’ Steve Tapp ‘Wrexham Trainer Revival’ (@Wxmmag) November 11, 2023
It wasn’t the first time the pair had stepped in to help local causes.
A £10,000 ($12,500) donation was made to the charity SANDS (Stillbirth & Neonatal Death Society) after a GoFundMe page was set up by Wrexham midfielder Jordan Davies and partner Kelsey Edwards following the death of their baby son Arthur in December 2021.
Asked about the recent gift to help keep Wrexham Trainer Revival, a popular shop with Wrexham supporters, in business, McElhenney replies: “We have felt so welcomed into this community. From very early on, if not day one, the people of Wrexham were willing to see what we were all about. Curious, with open hearts. Throughout that entire process, we’ve felt nothing but the support of the community. And we just like to return that in any way we can.”
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That early curiosity on behalf of the Wrexham people has long since given way to a sense of gratitude and affection for what Hollywood has done for an area hit hard by the closure of the mines a generation ago. Those warm feelings are reciprocated.
McElhenney adds: “To watch people all over the world, but specifically people in the United States, find themselves in this small town in north Wales was really profound.
“The fact they then — which we were hoping they would do — transferred their interest and love for the people of Wrexham into love and interest for the football team has been one of the great joys and experiences of my life.”
(Top photos: Getty Images; design: Sam Richardson)