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Wrexham AFC’s underdog story for the ages will add several very dramatic, and pricey, chapters.
The Welsh soccer club secured its third consecutive promotion on Saturday and will rise from EFL League One, the third rung of England’s pro soccer pyramid, to the second-tier EFL Championship. That leaves Wrexham just one level away from the Premier League—a mere four years after Hollywood stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney completed a roughly $2.5 million deal for a club with a proud history over its 161 years of history, but one toiling in the fifth tier and previously teetering on financial collapse.
The rise to the EFL Championship and the heightened proximity to the Premier League raises the stakes considerably for Wrexham.
During the 2022-23 season, according to Deloitte, League One clubs averaged $13 million in revenue, while EFL Championship clubs averaged more than $41 million with the additional commercial opportunities available and heightened fan interest.
Wrexham already was operating much like an EFL Championship franchise, as the club said last month it generated $35.6 million in revenue for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2024, up 155% from the prior year and an organization record.
The next annual report, covering a period before it starts play at the higher level, will almost certainly show even higher revenues. Even before that release, however, plans are afoot to expand the 13,341-seat capacity of its home field, the Racecourse Ground, and ultimately get to as many as 55,000 seats, a figure much more in line with the top venues in the Premier League.
Helping further boost interest in Wrexham will be the planned May 15 debut of the fourth season of Welcome to Wrexham, the documentary series that has been a boon to the franchise both in terms of exposure and finances—particularly as nearly half of its revenue comes from outside of the U.K.
Wrexham will also need to be more active in the player transfer market, and compete more vigorously for talent. In League One, player salaries average about $265,000, but that figure jumps to roughly $825,000 in the EFL Championship and to more than $4 million in the Premier League.
“The jump in salaries is incredible, mind-blowing,” said Wrexham manager Phil Parkinson. “Even coming up to [League One], the jump to get players of Championship quality is expensive, but obviously with the next level, I don’t think people outside football quite realize. They think players in League One must be multi-millionaires, but the drop-off from what people read about Premier League players when they come down is huge.”
