Reading will see Wrexham as a source for hope ahead of first meeting in two decades
Wrexham and Reading will face each other for the first time since 2001 in a clash that shines a glaring light on the two club's disparate fortunes across the last two decades
If we’re being technical about it, Wrexham will take on Reading with the momentum against them.
Twenty-six years have elapsed since the Red Dragons managed a win against the Royals - a run part-inspired by their own manager, Phil Parkinson, who captained Alan Pardew’s side in a 2-0 win at the Racecourse on their way to League One promotion in 2001 when these two sides last met.
Seven years later, Wrexham were relegated from League Two, ending an 87-year stay in the Football League and setting into motion the club’s 16-year non-league purgatory.
At the same time, Reading were relegated from the Premier League: a demotion that arguably pales in comparison to dropping out from the bottom of the EFL.
READ MORE: Sky Sports fans can save £216 on their bill, here's three other reasons you'll want to pick itREAD MORE: Wrexham star James McClean mocks Bolton in savage jibe after League One clashAhead of Saturday’s first clash between the two clubs since that fateful day in 2001, it’s difficult not to focus on the recent trajectories of both clubs to reach this point: one moving implacably skyward, pushing forward with momentum and steam and that obvious and necessary caveat of Hollywood star dust; the other being dragged down through every trapdoor by something more sinister than gravity, another cautionary tale in the boundless repercussions of bad ownership.
The latter is something with which Wrexham fans can empathise with, having been reliant on their Supporters' Trust to save the club from oblivion just 13 years ago. From there, the club were marooned in the fifth tier of English football.
Those days can feel like another dimension entirely compared to the chimeric head trip the last four years under Rob McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds’ stewardship has been. The It's Always Sunny actor and Deadpool star have transformed a once battered and bruised giant into its own industrial complex - and more importantly brought back that all important sense of hope to a club that was largely devoid of it for so long.
The hope is that a similar revitalisation can occur for Reading, whose mismanagement under Dai Yongge has been one of English football's larger stains in its modern era. The former top-flight club has been relegated and docked 18 points under Yongge’s stewardship for breaking a series of EFL financial rules, including late and non-payments.
Amid shocking tales of cost-cutting exercises – including a rejig of training plans to avoid paying for undersoil heating – their senior women’s team, once a touchstone of the women’s face in England, was demoted to the fifth tier this summer while their academy was disbanded.
The pressure facing Yongge, who acquired the club with his sister in the summer of 2017, to sell in recent months has subsequently reached fever pitch. And it is ultimately his stewardship that sees the club lining up against Wrexham once again in League One 23 years later from their first time, an exercise in cruel whiplash.
Insert: Rob Couhig. The former Wycombe Wanderers owner has arrived on scene promising to reverse the years of malaise and decay under Yongge’s turbulent reign.
It’s an intriguing move from the 75-year-old American businessman, who sold his 90% share in Wycombe last year to the Georgian billionaire Mikhail Lomtadze and is set to purchase Reading in a deal reportedly worth £30million.
Couhig, who helped get Wycombe promoted to the Championship following the curtailed Covid season, attended Reading's League One season opener against Wigan Athletic, which the Royals won 2-0. His presence became a refreshing sign for fans hoping to see a deal hashed out and rubber stamped sooner rather than later.
The hope surrounding the club’s future looks to be manifesting on the pitch, or at least early results have at least belied the previous turmoil. Their opening victory was followed by a draw with promotion favourites Birmingham City, albeit Ruben Selles’ side could feel aggrieved not to have taken all three points from the Blues after the hosts were awarded a late, controversial penalty.
Wrexham, too, have relished a positive start to life in League One and also go into Saturday's clash on an unbeaten run.
As Reading supporters look to the future under the aegis of potential new American ownership, their previous opponents in Birmingham and Saturday's opponents in Wrexham (Reynolds is Canadian while McElhenney is American) become comparable considerations. American ownership continues to be a mystery box in British football. The track record of more notable ownership groups -- the Glazers at Manchester United, Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital at Chelsea, Tom Hicks and George Gillette at Liverpool -- can inspire invidious responses.
Tom Wagner and the rest of Birmingham's hierarchy were censured at the end of last season for poor decisions, including the sacking of John Eustace, the hiring of Wayne Rooney and the failure to make the most of what should have been a positive season.
READ MORE: Reading Women withdrawal from Championship confirmed in latest ownership blowWrexham's Hollywood ownership have become an anomaly in this space, injecting the club and town not only with a feel-good factor and securing successive promotions -- the first in the club's long history -- but opening the door to the financial mecca of American sponsorship and profile.
While Couhig does not tout the same glitz and glamour that Wrexham's ownership duo do, the New Orleans local was a solid and safe pair of hands during his time at Wycombe, and that really should be music to the ears for Royals.
Although Wycombe were a team on the up when he purchased them, he left the club in a better state of affairs than when he took them over: a simple success that can feel all too rare in today's game.
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