Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney have turned Wrexham around, but they have still endured some tough moments as owners.
Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney bought Wrexham in 2021, overseeing their first full season in 2021/22.
It was a year of change at the Racecourse Ground, which included Wrexham signing Paul Mullin and appointing Phil Parkinson as manager.
The new arrivals had an almost instant impact, with the Red Dragons pushing for automatic promotion out of the National League.
However, they came up short in the hunt for first place, being forced to compete in the play-offs.
It was here where Rob and Ryan became the recipients of a truly bizarre gift, as Humphrey Ker has explained this week.
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Grimsby Town’s bizarre gift to Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney
Wrexham faced off with Grimsby Town in the 2021/22 National League play-off semi-finals.
It was an exciting game, but in the end, the Welsh outfit suffered a 5-4 defeat and were forced to remain in the fifth tier for another year.
Now, speaking on the High Performance podcast this week, Wrexham chief Ker has shared what Grimsby sent Rob and Ryan after beating them.
He was discussing Reynolds and McElhenney’s reaction to English football fans and, when doing so, confirmed that the play-off semi-final victors decided to send the actors some fish.
Ker stated: “When we got beaten by Grimsby in the playoff semi-final, the Grimsby fans, when they went like 4-3 up or something like that, they started singing ‘we stink of fish, we stink of fish’ because you know they’re the cod army or whatever they are.
“And again they’re like [Rob and Ryan], were like, ‘what are they saying, what are they saying’.
“They’re saying they stink of fish, and they [Rob and Ryan] were like ‘why? Why would anyone do that?’
“And I was like ‘well, I don’t know because that’s their nickname’. And they also sent us a load, they sent us a load of herring or something like that in an ice box for Rob and Ryan. The Grimsby directors had been like here’s some fish.”
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What Ryan Reynolds told Phil Parkinson after Wrexham loss to Grimsby
The play-off defeat was perhaps the lowest moment of the North American pair’s stint as owners.
But Reynolds’ message to Parkinson after the game was upbeat and has now well and truly come to fruition.
Parkinson said: “The big thing for me, straight after the game, Ryan just said to me ‘Look Phil, we’re gonna build this squad even stronger, we know, you know where we’ve fallen short’, that’s just literally on the pitch after the game.
“They both messaged me on their flight back saying that, and that meant a lot to me because it was a blow, of course, we’d took Stockport to the wire, which I felt was a decent achievement because Stockport had been building for a long time for that season, we were playing catch-up in many respects.”