No matter how much you agree or disagree with the narrative of Wrexham’s rise in recent years being a fairytale, you can’t deny that it’s been impressive. Since Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney completed their takeover of the club in early 2021, the Welsh side have been on an incredible run. Having competed in the […]
No matter how much you agree or disagree with the narrative of Wrexham’s rise in recent years being a fairytale, you can’t deny that it’s been impressive. Since Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney completed their takeover of the club in early 2021, the Welsh side have been on an incredible run.
Having competed in the 5th tier of English football since 2008, Reynolds and McElhenney’s first job was getting their new business venture back into the EFL. After installing Phil Parkinson as manager, Wrexham begin signing high profile players.
The first of these was Paul Mullin, League Two’s player of the year from the previous season.
Despite signing Ollie Palmer for a club record fee in January, Wrexham still couldn’t get over the line.
However, next season would be different. With the help of a temporarily retired Ben Foster, Wrexham’s would win the National League title after accumulating 111 points.
But the good times didn’t stop there. They would make it back-to-back promotions the very next season after finishing 2nd in League Two and three in a row after finishing 2nd in League One the season after.
Wrexham are now in the Championship.
During his two seasons in the National League as a Wrexham player, Paul Mullin scored 66 league goals. Upon his return to League Two, he found the net 24 times and provided 6 assists in 38 league matches.
Then Wrexham got to League One. Only three goals in the 3rd tier meant that following promotion to the Championship, Mullin was deemed surplus to requirements.
It’s fair to say that he wasn’t very happy about this. He recently spoke of how he was “never going to accept it” and that it’s something he’s “found quite challenging.”
One can understand his frustration. Given how instrumental he was in Wrexham’s rise, being unceremoniously sent out on loan could’ve have been easy.
Mullin was loaned out to Wigan Athletic where he scored 4 goals in 20 league appearances (only 7 of which were starts) before the loan was cut short. Mullin has since joined playoff chasing Bradford City on loan until the end of the season.
When you have a strategy like Wrexham’s there are always going to be casualties. Putting players on such big wages is all well and good until you get to a certain level.
Once you hit this ceiling, the players who have got you to this point, if not deemed good enough, will have to make way for new players. But because of their incredibly high wages, these players are difficult to move on, especially on permanent deals.
This could be a big problem for Wrexham if they are promoted to the Premier League. With the Welsh side currently sat in the playoff places, it might be something worth considering.
