Welcome Wrexham

[Carver]

Leigh RMI were the proper cack team the one season we were down there in 04/05.
We were so fortunate to come straight back up after going down.

 

[THE LAST WALTZ]

I just hope the Hollywood boys don’t get bored with their toy and walk off leaving them in the shit.
They can spend what they like as long as they put the money in themselves in the form of equity, not loans
There are no FFP rules in leagues 1&2 regarding debts however.
Just look at Orient, insolvent to the tune of some £17million.
Our American owners are going to put their hand in their pocket again in the summer but they have said that the club will be run sustainably and I guess we have to just hope that’s true.
This is not having a dig at Wrexham as I am glad to see them back, it just always rings a few alarm bells when foreigners use football clubs as hobbies and toys.

 

[jacobncfc]

And yet strangely, Wealdstone and Dorking are 2 of the better footballing sides in the division. Neither big lump forward teams, especially Dorking who were very much ''lol defending is for girls" for most of the season.

Dorking is also a top five away day in any league. Brilliant day out.

 

[jacobncfc]

I’d be petrified too, as i know how fucking wank the conference is.

Just the thought of being back down in the pit of misery breaks me out into cold sweats.

We’ve never had this experience really, probably because we missed out the ‘being shit and embarrassed by Histon’ bit. Settled straight in as promotion contenders.

We’re definitely ready to come back, but think (particularly if we do it this season) it’ll be remembered fondly more than as a nightmare.

 

[JaredSUFC]

Croseo CPD Hollywood.

Wrecsam fans were among the better of the BELTs in the Conference (along with Tranmere), and they’re always great at Wales games. And the Cae Ras is one of, if not my favourite grounds.

The owners seem to have the clubs best interest at heart, both in the short and long term. I’m getting a little tired of hearing about them all the time, but it is a notable story.

This also means Sky will show at least two League 2 games next season, Wrexham v Salford and Salford v Wrexham.

As for the quality of the Conference it’s hard to tell this season. With two clubs on 100+ points it suggests that 1) that those two teams are exceptional, whilst 2) that there may be a lack of quality in the rest of the league.

 

[JaredSUFC]

We had lewes in our 1st season, canvey island, ebbsfleet. Also had 2 years of thinking it was heading and yayes!

Canvey Island resigned from the Conference in 2006 (and haven’t come close to it since).

 

[Conker]

I hope County make it back anyway after such a good effort, if they face Chesterfield on the way and smash them it will be great.

 

[northstandexile]

Canvey Island resigned from the Conference in 2006 (and haven’t come close to it since).

We played Concord Rangers (of Canvey Island) in FA Cup.
You know Adam isn’t one for accurate true detail.

 

[JaredSUFC]

We played Concord Rangers (of Canvey Island) in FA Cup.
You know Adam isn’t one for accurate true detail.

Canvey are veritable giants compared to their neighbours Concord.

 

[Son of Cod]

I just hope the Hollywood boys don’t get bored with their toy and walk off leaving them in the shit.
They can spend what they like as long as they put the money in themselves in the form of equity, not loans
There are no FFP rules in leagues 1&2 regarding debts however.
Just look at Orient, insolvent to the tune of some £17million.
Our American owners are going to put their hand in their pocket again in the summer but they have said that the club will be run sustainably and I guess we have to just hope that’s true.
This is not having a dig at Wrexham as I am glad to see them back, it just always rings a few alarm bells when foreigners use football clubs as hobbies and toys.

No chance you'll be ran sustainably if you continue the level of spending you did in Jan. Do you publish your accounts?

We’ve never had this experience really, probably because we missed out the ‘being shit and embarrassed by Histon’ bit. Settled straight in as promotion contenders.

We’re definitely ready to come back, but think (particularly if we do it this season) it’ll be remembered fondly more than as a nightmare.

Yep, same for us really. We had a little bit of that rude awakening stuff with back to back 11th places when we first went down but having Alan Connell and Liam Hearn in those teams took the edge of that considerably. From there on out it was four back to back playoff campaigns in the first stint and then straight back into them again last season and I also look back on it fondly.

 

[PuB]

No chance you'll be ran sustainably if you continue the level of spending you did in Jan. Do you publish your accounts?

Yep, same for us really. We had a little bit of that rude awakening stuff with back to back 11th places when we first went down but having Alan Connell and Liam Hearn in those teams took the edge of that considerably. From there on out it was four back to back playoff campaigns in the first stint and then straight back into them again last season and I also look back on it fondly.

We don’t currently have any debt, spending in January was about £300k to avoid the abyss, which was almost certainly covered by our cup runs. Money well spent if you ask me.

 

[Son of Cod]

We don’t currently have any debt, spending in January was about £300k to avoid the abyss, which was almost certainly covered by our cup runs. Money well spent if you ask me.

Certainly was well spent, not disagreeing wiht that. Not having any debt is irrelevant if we're talking about running a club sustainably though. I'd be very surprised if you're sustainable on your current wage budget going forward, plus you're going to spending big in the summer by the sounds of it.

 

[spireite]

Dorking is also a top five away day in any league. Brilliant day out.

Especially when Marc White rocks up and puts money behind the bar for everyone. What a guy

 

[Reremnart]

I just hope the Hollywood boys don’t get bored with their toy and walk off leaving them in the shit.
They can spend what they like as long as they put the money in themselves in the form of equity, not loans
There are no FFP rules in leagues 1&2 regarding debts however.
Just look at Orient, insolvent to the tune of some £17million.
Our American owners are going to put their hand in their pocket again in the summer but they have said that the club will be run sustainably and I guess we have to just hope that’s true.
This is not having a dig at Wrexham as I am glad to see them back, it just always rings a few alarm bells when foreigners use football clubs as hobbies and toys.

I just don`t trust American club owners. We had a bad experience of one many years ago and there have been more than a few since. The Glazers, the Hicks and Gillett partnership at Anfield to name just but 2. They are here to make money nothing else and I just don`t see what these two guys motivation is other than their TV Show. I really don`t . I read somewhere that all the money they have ploughed into Wrexham is in fact loans and that they are charging a high interest rate on said loans. I don`t know how true it is but it certainly flags it up if it is fact.

 

[Master D]

We will need to get used to not winning every week at home, but we won't have to be near perfect to gain promotion like we have been this season. We've lost 1 league game at home in 2 seasons, when we had 10 men for an hour. We won't be scoring 3 goals a game at home anymore and teams will have a lot more pride in performance, there's a load of joke teams in the NL who give up once the first goal goes in.

Lots of things that have been said are accurate, especially the Parkinson stuff. He's still the man to get us from here but we will probably need someone from after the Jurassic period if we end up in L1. The likes of O'Connor, Lee and Mullin are easily good enough for this level and the one above. Mullin takes all the headlines but O'Connor is probably the best player at the club and the one playing most below his real level, a Rolls Royce in defence or midfield. Whenever he's not in the lineup there's an element of panic in the fanbase. I reckon we might bring in 2 into the starting 11 but can't see huge changes. Might be completely wrong but the players I'm reading about positively starring for teams in this league makes me think our team is already good enough. Clubs getting into a bidding WAR for Akil Wright for example.

A keeper is the main priority and I think upgrading Palmer, won't be surprised to see him leave if he's told he won't be first choice. Palmer wasn't trusted in the deciding game of the season which says a lot. We've been messing around with the keeper situation for years now and it needs sorting once and for all.

There was insane pressure to get promotion this season but it won't be as crucial in L2, it won't be a disaster if we don't go up straight away. Stockport are up there this season so on that basis I reckon we will be too. Notts County will be as well, the best coached team I have seen in 15 years down there. I didn't think anyone could play the football they do in that league, be amazed if they don't win the playoffs.

 

[PuB]

Certainly was well spent, not disagreeing wit that. Not having any debt is irrelevant if we're talking about running a club sustainably though. I'd be very surprised if you're sustainable on your current wage budget going forward, plus you're going to spending big in the summer by the sounds of it.

I would be very surprised if we weren’t sustainable on our current budget given the extremely low calibre of players we brought in last summer, one was literally playing Sunday league football, another was playing for a serie B b team.

We had to improve the squad, but none of the players we’ve brought in are out of place in terms of either playing for us, or playing in this division.

 

[Son of Cod]

I would be very surprised if we weren’t sustainable on our current budget given the extremely low calibre of players we brought in last summer, one was literally playing Sunday league football, another was playing for a serie B b team.

We had to improve the squad, but none of the players we’ve brought in are out of place in terms of either playing for us, or playing in this division.

Fair enough, I admit I have no idea what your budget was last season and what you came down with in terms of outgoings so you're obviously way more in the know than me on that, so willing to accept that you might be sustainable right now. However you aren't taking Lapslie and Hawkins off Mansfield, Nicholls off Crawley and bringing Dieng in all in Jan without splashing BIG wages for this level. A few more of them and you aren't breaking even on crowds of less than 5,500, in my opinion.

 

[PuB]

Fair enough, I admit I have no idea what your budget was last season and what you came down with in terms of outgoings so you're obviously way more in the know than me on that, so willing to accept that you might be sustainable right now. However you aren't taking Lapslie and Hawkins off Mansfield, Nicholls off Crawley and bringing Dieng in all in Jan without splashing BIG wages for this level. A few more of them and you aren't breaking even on crowds of less than 5,500, in my opinion.

Mansfield, Exeter and Crawley are no bigger than us, so how would they afford their massive wages?

I’m not saying we didn’t spend, we clearly did, but we weren’t buying players from two divisions higher and paying them more than their original clubs. Unlike Wrexham.

 

[LeonTheGreen]

Been a bit of talk down here that they’ll take Danny Mayor off us. He’s 32 now, 33 in October and with us very likely to go up, don’t think we’ll offer him a new deal. He’s also from up near that way.

 

[jacobncfc]

There was insane pressure to get promotion this season but it won't be as crucial in L2, it won't be a disaster if we don't go up straight away.

I’m really interested from the outside to see how the interest and the whole narrative around you holds up now you’ve been promoted.

It really couldn’t have gone better from a story point of view, right from losing that ridiculous play-off game last year. This season should’ve been a bit of a damp squib as a spectacle with you winning it by miles, but you were somehow lucky enough to run into a team good enough to make it incredibly dramatic all the way through but without the resources to quite hold you off. It’s no wonder McElhenney and Reynolds say so many nice things about us.

League Two is unlikely to have anywhere near the drama and you’ve lost that emotional hold thing of getting out of non-league finally, so it’ll be fascinating to see if people’s interest holds.

 

[Stocky]

We will need to get used to not winning every week at home, but we won't have to be near perfect to gain promotion like we have been this season. We've lost 1 league game at home in 2 seasons, when we had 10 men for an hour. We won't be scoring 3 goals a game at home anymore and teams will have a lot more pride in performance, there's a load of joke teams in the NL who give up once the first goal goes in.

Lots of things that have been said are accurate, especially the Parkinson stuff. He's still the man to get us from here but we will probably need someone from after the Jurassic period if we end up in L1. The likes of O'Connor, Lee and Mullin are easily good enough for this level and the one above. Mullin takes all the headlines but O'Connor is probably the best player at the club and the one playing most below his real level, a Rolls Royce in defence or midfield. Whenever he's not in the lineup there's an element of panic in the fanbase. I reckon we might bring in 2 into the starting 11 but can't see huge changes. Might be completely wrong but the players I'm reading about positively starring for teams in this league makes me think our team is already good enough. Clubs getting into a bidding WAR for Akil Wright for example.

A keeper is the main priority and I think upgrading Palmer, won't be surprised to see him leave if he's told he won't be first choice. Palmer wasn't trusted in the deciding game of the season which says a lot. We've been messing around with the keeper situation for years now and it needs sorting once and for all.

There was insane pressure to get promotion this season but it won't be as crucial in L2, it won't be a disaster if we don't go up straight away. Stockport are up there this season so on that basis I reckon we will be too. Notts County will be as well, the best coached team I have seen in 15 years down there. I didn't think anyone could play the football they do in that league, be amazed if they don't win the playoffs.

Welcome back to this forum. Congratulations on the promotion.

You'll definitely be up there, we've made a hit and miss job of our recruitment this season, had lots of injuries, have never really played that well consistently all season but are in the mix. Our first 10 games were shocking too.

It is a harder league across the board, there isn't many weeks you can just turn up and roll someone over, the games are much tighter. But there isn't much to fear, you get punished a touch more if you're lax defensively etc. The usual stuff.

I think you'll do back to back. Never understood this Parkinson will hold you back, he's done well.

 

[Son of Cod]

Mansfield, Exeter and Crawley are no bigger than us, so how would they afford their massive wages?

I’m not saying we didn’t spend, we clearly did, but we weren’t buying players from two divisions higher and paying them more than their original clubs. Unlike Wrexham.

Oh come off it, you're quite clearly upping their wages. Do you seriously think Lapslie and Hawkins left a playoff/promotion race to join a relegation scrap because of their allegiance to the good ship Gillingham? Dieng was in the L2 Team of the Year last season and was playing regular L1 football and at the age of 31 he's not dropping down a division to play on the same money is he?

 

[Laker]

What a fairytale it is that a side with a bigger budget way bigger than anyone else’s got promoted.

Almost magical.

Of course welcome, and it’s deserved but the wankfest over them is unbearable.

Lol just caught up on this thread. Aren’t you forgetting Mansfield’s promotion season from the conference when you chucked a ton of money at it?!? The only thing magical about your promotion was the open top bus celebrations.

 

[Stocky]

Olaofe was offered a lot of money to go to Gillingham in January. I've said it hundred times on here so apologies for repeating myself.

We obviously offer a good wage ourselves but I was told we offered a fair bit less than Gillingham but sold him more on the footballing side with our training ground etc. Plus Gillingham did look right in the relegation battle at this point, there was probably some trepidation over that.

 

[BarraMatt]

We will need to get used to not winning every week at home, but we won't have to be near perfect to gain promotion like we have been this season. We've lost 1 league game at home in 2 seasons, when we had 10 men for an hour. We won't be scoring 3 goals a game at home anymore and teams will have a lot more pride in performance, there's a load of joke teams in the NL who give up once the first goal goes in.

Lots of things that have been said are accurate, especially the Parkinson stuff. He's still the man to get us from here but we will probably need someone from after the Jurassic period if we end up in L1. The likes of O'Connor, Lee and Mullin are easily good enough for this level and the one above. Mullin takes all the headlines but O'Connor is probably the best player at the club and the one playing most below his real level, a Rolls Royce in defence or midfield. Whenever he's not in the lineup there's an element of panic in the fanbase. I reckon we might bring in 2 into the starting 11 but can't see huge changes. Might be completely wrong but the players I'm reading about positively starring for teams in this league makes me think our team is already good enough. Clubs getting into a bidding WAR for Akil Wright for example.

A keeper is the main priority and I think upgrading Palmer, won't be surprised to see him leave if he's told he won't be first choice. Palmer wasn't trusted in the deciding game of the season which says a lot. We've been messing around with the keeper situation for years now and it needs sorting once and for all.

There was insane pressure to get promotion this season but it won't be as crucial in L2, it won't be a disaster if we don't go up straight away. Stockport are up there this season so on that basis I reckon we will be too. Notts County will be as well, the best coached team I have seen in 15 years down there. I didn't think anyone could play the football they do in that league, be amazed if they don't win the playoffs.

What do you reckon you'll do with Waters? Obviously you'd offered us something reasonable for us to accept but it was just for cover at the end of the day. He will have seen the digits on the contract to tempt him over but it might not have been the best long term move on his behalf if you get shut of him in the summer. He's inconsistent at best at this level.

 

[Dan_Macclad]

Wouldn't be surprised to see Wrexham in the championship within 5 years.. Massive congrats chaps and chappettes.. If any fanbase deserves it, it's the longstanding wrexham fans.

 

[PuB]

Oh come off it, you're quite clearly upping their wages. Do you seriously think Lapslie and Hawkins left a playoff/promotion race to join a relegation scrap because of their allegiance to the good ship Gillingham? Dieng was in the L2 Team of the Year last season and was playing regular L1 football and at the age of 31 he's not dropping down a division to play on the same money is he?

Well that’s not what I’ve said is it, in fact I said quite the opposite in that we’ve clearly spent money, but not an unusual amount for us or this division. Which is where the difference is with Wrexham buying players from two divisions higher.

Dieng was mostly coming off the bench for Exeter btw, Lapslie and Hawkins both wanted out of Mansfield for whatever reason.

Let’s return to the sustainability talk when you guys start spending your cup cash monies.

 

[joethegill]

Oh come off it, you're quite clearly upping their wages. Do you seriously think Lapslie and Hawkins left a playoff/promotion race to join a relegation scrap because of their allegiance to the good ship Gillingham? Dieng was in the L2 Team of the Year last season and was playing regular L1 football and at the age of 31 he's not dropping down a division to play on the same money is he?

Maybe we paid a little extra for a couple of players - but just to improve a squad that was literally built on the thinnest of shoestrings. I don't think fans of other clubs realise quite how in the shit we were financially. I doubt we're paying Wrexham style over the odds wages though, just paying what we can now afford.

We've had a really good year cup wise as well, trips to Brentford and Wolves in the League Cup and televised games at home to Dagenham and Leicester in the FA Cup. That brought in a fair amount and has covered the majority of our January outlays. Bigger crowds since the Galinson's turned up has helped too, with regular 7k+ crowds rather than 4k+ as we were getting before.

As I've said countless times, we've signed a bunch of decent level League Two players. We had to. We've been one of the best teams in the league for nearly half a season consistently, and only in the last few weeks have we moved away from the danger zone so it shows how important those signings were. If we had to pay them an extra £50 a week to get them to move here from the powerhouses that are Exeter and Mansfield then I'd consider that money well spent.

Anyway, Wrexham.

 

[Master D]

What do you reckon you'll do with Waters? Obviously you'd offered us something reasonable for us to accept but it was just for cover at the end of the day. He will have seen the digits on the contract to tempt him over but it might not have been the best long term move on his behalf if you get shut of him in the summer. He's inconsistent at best at this level.

No idea, he never even made the bench once. He'll make his debut this weekend though!

I thought at the time he might play a couple of games and move on in the summer with us writing off the contract, that was the crazy level of contingency planning that Notts' challenge forced us into doing. He was cover incase something happened to Mullin.

Having 7 subs in this league makes a difference though so expect he'll be 4th choice and get the odd game here and there. Or maybe we'll just loan him out for the season like we did Hyde this year.

Either way I see us bringing in another striker in the Palmer mould. We've been linked with Alfie May for an eternity but that isn't a match and don't see him and Mullin working.

 

[AdamStag]

Canvey Island resigned from the Conference in 2006 (and haven’t come close to it since).

It was grays,not canvey island.

It was some other tinpot southern side no-one had ever heard of.