From Wrexham to Swansea and, perhaps soon, Cardiff: is the need for narratives leading the rich and famous to Welsh football?
Two years ago, an American couple at Crewe train station asked me if they were on the right platform. They’d travelled from the other side of the world to go on a football pilgrimage.
Crewe is a short hop to the stadium tours and superstores of Liverpool and Manchester’s Premier League clubs. But they were on the right platform for their destination: Wrexham.
This isn’t another take on the relentless Hollywood promotion machine which is Wrexham AFC. More than enough has been written.
What they’ve achieved has been brilliantly executed by all concerned having done their research – identifying a club in a working-class football hotbed with a fanatical fanbase and a rich history; people, place and past combining with superstar glamour to create a narrative to capture the imagination.
Four seasons, three promotions and 49 episodes later it appears that the beautiful game’s combination of cash and need for narrative is now turning its attention to the rest of Wales and the other Cymru members of the English Football League.
Yes, the EFL 92 features four Welsh clubs, and this historical anomaly may be about to pay dividends for the clubs across (cliché alert) Offa’s Dyke.
There will always be one fan in the away end of every visiting English club brandishing an inflatable sheep, but no one will care if the Cymru clubs are in financial football fashion.
Wrexham, Swansea, Cardiff… Newport?
Having seen what’s happened with Wrexham, Swansea City said, ‘hold my beer’. First, serial Champions League winner Luka Modric became a “co-owner” of the club, which was naturally followed by rapper Snoop Dogg joining the board.
Modric refused to mix business with pleasure by signing for AC Milan, but Snoop immediately got down to it with a kit reveal and a mural promoting an ice cream brand.
I’m unsure of Snoop’s past allegiance to “Swansea City Soccer Club [sic]”. Maybe he used to watch them over at Catherine Zeta Jones’s house.
Although it’s more likely that a combination of Swansea’s sponsors, the smarts of CEO Tom Gorringe and the Wrexham effect have combined to offer Snoop (and Modric) a soccer storyline to be part of.
With the two having a combined Instagram reach of 125m, a lot of people are now watching.
Football offers some financial certainties thanks to seasonal TV money, but absolutely none on the pitch where very few ever win silverware. A 46-game season can culminate in finishing 12th, so narratives are increasingly as important in capturing fans and commercial opportunities.
Down the M4 and another story is playing out at Cardiff City, where local boy, serial Champions League winner and national hero Gareth Bale is leading a consortium attempting to buy the recently relegated Bluebirds — presenting the prospect of Bale v Modric in the directors’ box in 2026-27. Millions of Madristas around the world would be intrigued by that.
Talking of Spanish giants, the fourth Welsh league club, Newport County got in on the unlikely storytelling act last week.
A kit launch, in partnership with Athletic Bilbao – centred on the city sheltering child refugees during the Spanish Civil War – was beautifully done, put the club on an international platform and sold as many shirts internationally as in Newport.
Club owner Huw Jenkins clearly has an eye on the bigger picture as well, having previously taken Swansea City from financial peril to the Premier League.
County too, after a dozen seasons of survival in League Two, are the perfect fit for any Hollywood actor, Grammy-nominated rapper or Ballon D’or winner looking for their next ‘journey’.
A “proud working-class city and club. An underdog that bites back” – Snoop’s words at his Swansea reveal say everything about the potential attraction of Welsh football to the rich and famous right now.
Football today is both a sport and a content provider. A story to be told on and off the pitch. Post-Wrexham, Wales’s other underdog clubs might be the next must-watch. Coming to a streaming platform near you soon.
Matthew Fletcher-Jones is a sports communications consultant.
