Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney Explain Why They Bought a Welsh Soccer Team

One day during the pandemic, Ryan Reynolds decided to DM Rob McElhenney on Instagram. The two had never met. Days later, Reynolds sent McElhenney a case of gin. Months later, still having never met, the text buddies wondered wither they should buy a European football club. Then, Reynolds and McElhenney went ahead and actually bought a European football club. What do they know about running a football club? Reynolds: “We don’t know anything about running a football club.” They still have not met. The football season is currently more than half over.

“So I said to my wife, ‘Do you think if it’s a good idea if I ask Ryan if he wants to be a partner?’” McElhenney remembers, recounting his initial pitch to Reynolds in the Men’s Health May cover story (Reynolds conducted the interview). “And she said, 'Well, that depends on whether or not your ego can take sharing space with Ryan Reynolds.' And the truth is, my first thought was Ooh, you’re right. But that’s the kind of partnership we have: recognizing what my strengths are and my stretches are, and vice versa.”

Reynolds agrees. He says he instantly recognized McElhenney’s discipline and character. Though he sees the public discourse around their decision a bit different than, say, acute business partners complimenting each other’s business acuteness. “I don’t know if that’s the narrative,” Reynolds says. “I think the narrative is two friends buy football club in Wrexham, and then you hear a lot of locals in Wrexham say, ‘Why Wrexham?’”

Wrexham A.F.C. is a Welsh football club, which competes in the National League—the fifth tier in English football. If Manchester United is the Boston Red Sox, then Wrexham A.F.C is like the Salem Red Sox, Boston’s Low-A minor league team. It’s not a completely accurate comparison, but it’s the best we’ve got; nothing in American sports is quite like English football. (Currently, Wrexham stands at no 8 in the table, 17 points behind the lead, if that means anything to you.)

Reynolds and McElhenney chose Wrexham, because, well, because why the hell not? “And it became a sort of multi-tiered project,” says Reynolds. “It was us not just purchasing a football club in the national league, but really working on a community that surrounds that club and getting involved in the community around that club and growing that. And that’s the thing that really hooked me.”

Wrexham captain Shaun Pearson joked about finding out who purchased the club in an interview late last year: “I’m probably similar to everyone else; at first you think: ‘Nah, no way.’ But it is potentially a big opportunity for the club. It is probably a little while off in terms of everything going through but you’d be lying if you didn’t think it was exciting.”

Reynolds and McElhenney will reportedly put over $2 million into the club, an investment that will prove critical in an English football league—already far less funded than top-tier teams—hit hard by Covid-19. The celebrity owners hope to rebuild facilities and help the club better compete against league rivals.

They also have other plans as well, but they can’t talk about them yet. Just know that it’s time to get excited about lower league English football.

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