Ahead of a season where Wrexham can put behind them the catalogue of misfortune and misery that dumped the club into the football wilderness for a generation, Fleetwood Town were fitting opponents for the final dress rehearsal.
Twelve years ago, thanks to the goalscoring heroics of future England striker Jamie Vardy, Fleetwood broke Welsh hearts in an epic Conference title race when they prevailed with 103 points.
Wrexham, having finished five points behind the coastal club, lost in the play-offs to earn the unwanted record of the highest points total to not win promotion in the top five divisions.
It proved the closest that Wrexham, relegated out of the EFL in a sorry state at the end of the 2007-08 season, came to escaping the fifth tier until Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney rode into town.
The scars of missing out to a Vardy-inspired Fleetwood continued to run deep for years, a point Phil Parkinson acknowledged last season to The Athletic when discussing his side’s 2023 title success after a similarly hard-fought tussle with Notts County.
“There was a late kick-off game featuring Notts County on TV in the boardroom after we’d played earlier in the day and won,” he said. “Langstaff (Notts striker Macaulay) scored and I looked around a few of the vice-presidents and sensed this (feeling of), ‘Oh, here we go again — it’s like Vardy and Fleetwood all over again’.”
After back-to-back promotions, any lingering fatalism has gone. Instead, there is optimism ahead of their return to League One. They are back where they were before all the points deductions, the terrible owners and the financial problems started a slide that very nearly saw the club disappear altogether.
Only the devotion of their long-suffering fans kept the lights on. That 2011-12 title tussle with Fleetwood was the first of 10 full seasons when the club was run by the Wrexham Supporters Trust.
The reward for that unstinting loyalty is a return to League One for the first time in 19 years. Parkinson’s side are joining a division where the promotion race promises to be a fascinating affair, with favourites Birmingham City having already spent a colossal £13million ($16.6m) this summer.
Strong challenges are also expected from Rotherham United, Peterborough United, Charlton Athletic, Barnsley, Huddersfield Town, Blackpool and last season’s League Two champions Stockport County.
How Wrexham fare back in the third tier will be equally intriguing. Is a historic third straight promotion on the cards? Or is this a year of consolidation, where the club and it’s off-field operation is given time to catch up with the football side after jumping two levels in as many years.
Half a dozen signings have given the squad a timely refresh, the most recent being Plymouth Argyle central defender Dan Scarr. The 29-year-old joined on Friday night so did not feature against Fleetwood on a sunny afternoon at the Racecourse Ground.
Scarr has joined Wrexham from Plymouth (Gary Oakley/Getty Images)
Of the other summer arrivals, Arthur Okonkwo, the former Arsenal loanee who joined as a free agent, and former Charlton Athletic captain George Dobson made the starting XI, while Seb Revan and Lewis Brunt made their home bows as back-up goalkeeper Callum Burton watched from the bench.
Dobson caught the eye in a 1-0 victory, the holding midfielder using the ball well and always available when a team-mate wanted to off-load. Ryan Barnett also impressed on the right flank before being substituted in the final quarter, while Elliot Lee again provided plenty of attacking threat.
Max Cleworth settled a hard-fought contest in front of 6,376 fans, tapping in from close range after the visitors had failed to deal with a searching left wing cross on 71 minutes.
That, though, wasn’t the end of the action as both captains, James McClean and Brendan Wiredu, had to be kept apart by Wrexham substitute Will Boyle in the final minute.
Referee Scott Jackson, displaying welcome common sense considering no-one wants to go into a new season suspended, showed each of them a yellow card.
“The squad is getting there,” says Parkinson, who perhaps needs to add a proven striker at this level and genuine competition for Lee to turn his side into a genuine contender for automatic promotion amid such a quality field.
“I do feel we are getting there. We are working on a couple of other things to add a bit more quality to what we have already got to make sure we can compete at this level.”
Victory brought a tiny slice of revenge over Fleetwood for that season when Vardy netted 31 times in 36 league appearances, in the process earning himself a £1million move to Leicester City that, in time, would deliver a Premier League winners’ medal.
More importantly, however, it was a timely lift ahead of Wrexham returning to where they used to be. Parkinson can’t wait to compete once again at a level where he’s twice previously won promotion, with Colchester United and Bolton Wanderers.
“There are obvious candidates in terms of who will be strong,” he says, “with the money that certain teams have spent. Like Birmingham, who’ve almost had the (spending) power of a lower Premier League club, never mind a Championship club.
“It’s a very competitive division. There’s more money because of the new (EFL) TV deal, so people have been spending. Some of the prices we’ve been quoted for players are astronomical.
“The market has become a bit distorted, maybe because of Birmingham’s spending. But we’re pleased with the lads we’ve brought in and now it’s a case of, ‘Here we go again’.
“Let’s get ready for action.”
(Top photo: Ethan Cairns/Getty Images)
