There's so much in there that is as much about Charlton as any other club - what drives supporters, what football means to a community and the sun-stories of all the people and players involved with football clubs.
It gave me much to reflect about re: CAFC and my love for the club/football and what it all means
Watched most of it on my commute before binging on Family Guy. Thought it was excellent and felt nothing but admiration for Reynolds and McElhenney and their authenticity and huge amounts of jealousy (yes in an ideal world we'd be owned by lifelong die hard local boys done good- but that ship has well and truly sailed for now and in a world of chancers and wrong uns Wrexham have struck gold in the intentions stakes).
Was pleased for them as a town as it's lifted them and given them a boost when I don't expect it's the most prosperous of places.
The pub landlord was chatting to my boy as we got off train last night and whilst the fawning over their visit was gut wrenchingly cringeworthy all their fans on the trains etc seemed decent normal people many of whom whilst grateful for the way the Hollywood boys have lifted them out of the doldrums do have a feel of where were you when we were shit about the sudden bandwagon jumpers.
I'll probably feel like that if the planets aligned and we ever jumped up the leagues (lolz) and suddenly saw the Valley filled like yesterday for league fixtures I'd be a bit irked with the glory hunting stay aways. However after years of this malaise and turgid, uninspiring Saturdays I'm sure I'd suck it up for a regularly full buoyant Valley. No half n half scarves though. Never half n half scarves.
One thing it did better than the Sunderland Netflix was it really gave an insight into the players' lives and how they are just young men facing the same (and often worse) issues as 'normal people'....miscarriages, potential terminal illness of spouses, autistic children etc and all of the horrific challenges that come with it.
Blokes like Paul Mullin come across in it as nothing short of remarkable men and whilst I was hoping everything he and Palmer touched yesterday turned to shit I couldn't help but have huge respect for Mullin having got a real insight into him as a man through the programme.
Fuck their right back that took out Tyreece though....he got a proper angry balding middle aged man telling what for.
I've only watched a handful of episodes, and take on board and recognise the positives around the people community of Wrexham... but...
the underlying point about this is surely ultimately that however you dress it up, the Wrexham "story" is just financial doping or, more simply put, cheating? Great for Wrexham in the same way it's been great for Chelsea and City and for RB Leipzig... but their (ill-gotten) gain is at what cost to sporting competition and, also, to other traditional longstanding historic clubs and their depressed communities?
These guys took over and bought a top league one squad, whilst they were in the national league. If financial fair play applied at this level, which it should (it should apply across every professional league in Europe), what they have done would be illegal? Great for Wrexham, but how would that make Chesterfields, Notts Countys, Bradfords, Grimsbys, Port Vales - and now Charlton Athletics, Readings... AFC Wimbledons - they have built themselves back up sustainably and funded their own new stadium based on bonds from supporters. What chance do they have against this?
I have no issue or gripe with Wrexham as a place or club in principle, but for me this is just yet another contribution to the death of the wider football "family", other clubs, communities, culture... every one of these super-rich foreign owners who comes in and pumps obscene sums completely out of financial kilter with their entity is and has contributed to the scenario we have today where most clubs operate at enormous and extremely precarious losses - and pretty much the only possible hope of competing is for an american or middle eastern billionaire to buy you up and swallow the enormous losses this entails. Which is either a grotesque way to succeed, or an even more unpleasant way to drown to death when it goes wrong (CAFC, Reading, Wednesday).
these guys come across okay, fair enough, and repeat - great for the town of Wrexham. But this is just a combined vanity and profit motivation for them; it's not philanthropy, it's just a well-manicured story purporting to be. They specifically went after a club from a deprived isolated town because they wanted to construct this "something from nothing" narrative - but it's at the expense of both other clubs in the same boat trying to compete in a cut throat world, and a cut throat sport - and at the expense of the integrity of the sport.
It embarrassed me our fans singing where were you when you were shit yesterday, when we had 8,000 extra in our crowd who'd come down to see them - but the response was valid - their highest average HOME attendance in the 40 years prior to the hollywood coming in was 4,800, in the third tier, the same league they are in today. Suddenly they have 3,000 coming to the Valley and 13,000+ at the Racehorse Ground. Wrexham is a town of 50,000 people; their club today is a fake iteration of the historic football club, and I imagine a lot of those coming and enjoying this story are probably from other much less deprived surrounding areas jumping on the bandwagon.
when teams start playing "home" fixtures in the USA, Wrexham will have been a significant one of several contributing factors to that.
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
There were a lot of Yanks there yesterday and I’d imagine there is big interest in the States in the programme.
I’ve never seen it but mainly because I’m not paying extra for yet another channel. If it were on say the BBC I expect I would have.
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
You’re asking a group of Charlton supporters who would normally go regardless of who we was playing . If you asked a thousand random people who went yesterday ( and I know that couldn’t happen) I suspect it would have been a lot less than 70% who hadn’t seen an episode of the show . I’m not sure if that’s saying you are right or wrong ?
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
You don't have to have watched the programme to be aware of the Wrexham Hollywood factor, Ryan Reynolds, Beckham attending a game, Gary Neville there yesterday etc etc.
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
You don't have to have watched the programme to be aware of the Wrexham Hollywood factor, Ryan Reynolds, Beckham attending a game, Gary Neville there yesterday etc etc.
Yep, follow Reynolds on Instagram and you'll find him doing a piece about Deadpool while wearing a Wrexham cap for example, and will post plenty about wrexham, the pair of them market the brand football club well enough that fans of "them" will pick up on it regardless of watching the show or not.
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
It had decent viewing figures, originally based more on the celebrity factor than the football factor. This match was a opportunity option for fans of the show (many of whom would now consider themselves fans of Wrexham) who live in London, hence the big crowd.
Wish they’d bought us. Their whole ownership / management / recruitment set up is in a different league from ours.
I watched the first two seasons and half of the third. I like the episodes about the football, the players and the club. For me there are too many episodes that feel like the last story on the news, human interest stuff. So I stopped watching. I'd much rather watch Bunch of Amateurs on YouTube once a week.
So 70% from a group of L1 football fans never watching a single episode confirms to me the huge ramp up in our attendance yesterday was much wider than just the ‘Wrexham’ impact
It had decent viewing figures, originally based more on the celebrity factor than the football factor. This match was a opportunity option for fans of the show (many of whom would now consider themselves fans of Wrexham) who live in London, hence the big crowd.
Wish they’d bought us. Their whole ownership / management / recruitment set up is in a different league from ours.
I watched it for the celebrity factor as the clips I saw were very funny. There are also episodes on the ladies team, their oldest fan and long serving staff which were interesting.
If it was all about football, dressing room rants and Parky swearing I wouldn’t have bothered
@paulsturgess post above is excellent. The points he makes are backed up by people like Kieran Maguire (Price of Football). KM is the first to say that Wrexham fans deserved a break from years of crap ownership, that these two do seem like genuinely good guys and good owners. but that there should have been an FFP regime in place to curb the level of investment to make it less ridiculously unfair. Same is true of Birmingham.
Last night I watched the first 3 episodes of S1. Of course I enjoy it in some ways. But it was funny how I still have no clear idea, "why Wrexham, exactly?" Who suggested Wrexham to them in the first place? Why not Charlton, actually? We were "in play" then. That wasn't dealt with. In E3 we see them deciding to go after Paul Mullin. Rob is warned they'll have to break the budget. So they do. Just like that. I'd love to know what the budget actually was and how much they bloated it to get out of that league. But it isn't that kind of series, it seems. Pity.
It's possible to believe that these two are genuinely good owners, the fans and the town deserve them, and at the same time that the way they've been able to do this, financially, is dead wrong and needs to be stopped for the future. Both things can be (and IMO are) true.
@paulsturgess post above is excellent. The points he makes are backed up by people like Kieran Maguire (Price of Football). KM is the first to say that Wrexham fans deserved a break from years of crap ownership, that these two do seem like genuinely good guys and good owners. but that there should have been an FFP regime in place to curb the level of investment to make it less ridiculously unfair. Same is true of Birmingham.
Last night I watched the first 3 episodes of S1. Of course I enjoy it in some ways. But it was funny how I still have no clear idea, "why Wrexham, exactly?" Who suggested Wrexham to them in the first place? Why not Charlton, actually? We were "in play" then. That wasn't dealt with. In E3 we see them deciding to go after Paul Mullin. Rob is warned they'll have to break the budget. So they do. Just like that. I'd love to know what the budget actually was and how much they bloated it to get out of that league. But it isn't that kind of series, it seems. Pity.
It's possible to believe that these two are genuinely good owners, the fans and the town deserve them, and at the same time that the way they've been able to do this, financially, is dead wrong and needs to be stopped for the future. Both things can be (and IMO are) true.
The purpose of their purchasing a club was to make the documentary. So they weren’t necessarily looking for the best club/ opportunity to buy in the way most foreign buyers might be.
they specifically wanted to make a rags to riches documentary; so start low, and in a poor area in a town with only one club.
Charlton would have had very little to zero appeal in that respect as a recent premier league club , in one of the worlds richest cities, a big stadium, and “just another” London club.
They don’t talk about the budgets and things like that because obviously the entire purpose of the whole exercise is the rags to riches story. Which is obviously quite literally Hollywood fiction because there’s nothing rags to riches about it with the money they’ve had at their disposal.
Ignoring wrexham for a moment, I believe our London location, often talked about over the years as an advantage for potential investor attraction, is quite the opposite now. We are in a saturated London market where the overwhelming majority of our potential supporter growth is sucked up by more successful London clubs.
@paulsturgess again I think you are right on the money. Re your last para., it certainly occurred to me last night that their approach suits a town club. Rob talked convincingly about his NFL (?) club in Philly being a symbol of the community, just as we say about our clubs. And going back to 1990 we found that a bit of a stumbling block as a sell for the Valley Party campaign, because places like Eltham were already full of kids wearing Arsenal or Spurs shirts.
On the other hand though...I'm wondering about the Wrexham catchment area. The actual town isn't big. They are talking about building a new stand, but I can't see them getting much beyond 15k in the Championship if they get back there. And then when they just find themselves in mid-table (they might still, this season) how do you grow that fanbase further? London on the other hand has only carried on sucking people in, and now at last the SE corner has received some attention re housing and infra. So longer term I still think our location has more potential.
@paulsturgess again I think you are right on the money. Re your last para., it certainly occurred to me last night that their approach suits a town club. Rob talked convincingly about his NFL (?) club in Philly being a symbol of the community, just as we say about our clubs. And going back to 1990 we found that a bit of a stumbling block as a sell for the Valley Party campaign, because places like Eltham were already full of kids wearing Arsenal or Spurs shirts.
On the other hand though...I'm wondering about the Wrexham catchment area. The actual town isn't big. They are talking about building a new stand, but I can't see them getting much beyond 15k in the Championship if they get back there. And then when they just find themselves in mid-table (they might still, this season) how do you grow that fanbase further? London on the other hand has only carried on sucking people in, and now at last the SE corner has received some attention re housing and infra. So longer term I still think our location has more potential.
The North Wales catchment is huge. It’s not mad into rugby like the mid and south, they very much prefer football and up until now have been brought up as either real local clubs like those in the Welsh league or Man Yoo & the scouse lot.
So much so my other half couldn’t bring himself to support Man Yoo like the rest of his entire family but chose Spurs instead lol. Its amazing now that his younger sisters kids now all want to go to see Wrexham rather than the long trip to Old Trafford that they were doing. They live on Anglesey btw.
Yeh. I imagine there are loads of United / Liverpool “fans” there to be tapped up with appealing proper football. It’s not perfect but I guess you’re looking at that level for somebody with some level of stature/ league pedigree, wrexham makes sense Vs say chesterfield (dominated by the sheffield clubs), Oldham, Rochdale dominated by Manchester clubs etc. York is an affluent place so doesn’t work. I guess maybe a Grimsby could qualify. Carlisle.
Comments
There's so much in there that is as much about Charlton as any other club - what drives supporters, what football means to a community and the sun-stories of all the people and players involved with football clubs.
It gave me much to reflect about re: CAFC and my love for the club/football and what it all means
same with the Sunderland documentary. But I have to admit that I did watch the episode when they were crying in their beer at Wembley 🤭
the underlying point about this is surely ultimately that however you dress it up, the Wrexham "story" is just financial doping or, more simply put, cheating? Great for Wrexham in the same way it's been great for Chelsea and City and for RB Leipzig... but their (ill-gotten) gain is at what cost to sporting competition and, also, to other traditional longstanding historic clubs and their depressed communities?
These guys took over and bought a top league one squad, whilst they were in the national league. If financial fair play applied at this level, which it should (it should apply across every professional league in Europe), what they have done would be illegal? Great for Wrexham, but how would that make Chesterfields, Notts Countys, Bradfords, Grimsbys, Port Vales - and now Charlton Athletics, Readings... AFC Wimbledons - they have built themselves back up sustainably and funded their own new stadium based on bonds from supporters. What chance do they have against this?
I have no issue or gripe with Wrexham as a place or club in principle, but for me this is just yet another contribution to the death of the wider football "family", other clubs, communities, culture... every one of these super-rich foreign owners who comes in and pumps obscene sums completely out of financial kilter with their entity is and has contributed to the scenario we have today where most clubs operate at enormous and extremely precarious losses - and pretty much the only possible hope of competing is for an american or middle eastern billionaire to buy you up and swallow the enormous losses this entails. Which is either a grotesque way to succeed, or an even more unpleasant way to drown to death when it goes wrong (CAFC, Reading, Wednesday).
these guys come across okay, fair enough, and repeat - great for the town of Wrexham. But this is just a combined vanity and profit motivation for them; it's not philanthropy, it's just a well-manicured story purporting to be. They specifically went after a club from a deprived isolated town because they wanted to construct this "something from nothing" narrative - but it's at the expense of both other clubs in the same boat trying to compete in a cut throat world, and a cut throat sport - and at the expense of the integrity of the sport.
It embarrassed me our fans singing where were you when you were shit yesterday, when we had 8,000 extra in our crowd who'd come down to see them - but the response was valid - their highest average HOME attendance in the 40 years prior to the hollywood coming in was 4,800, in the third tier, the same league they are in today. Suddenly they have 3,000 coming to the Valley and 13,000+ at the Racehorse Ground. Wrexham is a town of 50,000 people; their club today is a fake iteration of the historic football club, and I imagine a lot of those coming and enjoying this story are probably from other much less deprived surrounding areas jumping on the bandwagon.
when teams start playing "home" fixtures in the USA, Wrexham will have been a significant one of several contributing factors to that.
F*ck them, and f*ck modern football.
No mention of trains apparently so no interest 🚂
I’ve never seen it but mainly because I’m not paying extra for yet another channel. If it were on say the BBC I expect I would have.
Yep, follow Reynolds on Instagram and you'll find him doing a piece about Deadpool while wearing a Wrexham cap for example, and will post plenty about wrexham, the pair of them market the brand football club well enough that fans of "them" will pick up on it regardless of watching the show or not.
If it was all about football, dressing room rants and Parky swearing I wouldn’t have bothered
Last night I watched the first 3 episodes of S1. Of course I enjoy it in some ways. But it was funny how I still have no clear idea, "why Wrexham, exactly?" Who suggested Wrexham to them in the first place? Why not Charlton, actually? We were "in play" then. That wasn't dealt with. In E3 we see them deciding to go after Paul Mullin. Rob is warned they'll have to break the budget. So they do. Just like that. I'd love to know what the budget actually was and how much they bloated it to get out of that league. But it isn't that kind of series, it seems. Pity.
It's possible to believe that these two are genuinely good owners, the fans and the town deserve them, and at the same time that the way they've been able to do this, financially, is dead wrong and needs to be stopped for the future. Both things can be (and IMO are) true.
they specifically wanted to make a rags to riches documentary; so start low, and in a poor area in a town with only one club.
They don’t talk about the budgets and things like that because obviously the entire purpose of the whole exercise is the rags to riches story. Which is obviously quite literally Hollywood fiction because there’s nothing rags to riches about it with the money they’ve had at their disposal.
On the other hand though...I'm wondering about the Wrexham catchment area. The actual town isn't big. They are talking about building a new stand, but I can't see them getting much beyond 15k in the Championship if they get back there. And then when they just find themselves in mid-table (they might still, this season) how do you grow that fanbase further? London on the other hand has only carried on sucking people in, and now at last the SE corner has received some attention re housing and infra. So longer term I still think our location has more potential.
Its amazing now that his younger sisters kids now all want to go to see Wrexham rather than the long trip to Old Trafford that they were doing.
They live on Anglesey btw.