Wrexham expect to be busy in the upcoming January transfer window as the ambitious Welsh club set their sight firmly on swift promotion to the Championship.
The club co-owned by Hollywood actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney have risen from the National League to League One, the fifth tier to the third tier, in the last two seasons. But they have already made light work of the higher level, two points off the automatic promotion places.
Wrexham director Shaun Harvey, a name familiar to the wider footballing world from Welcome to Wrexham, has explained that the Red Dragons will be active in trying to strengthen for both a promotion push and also then surviving/thriving in the next league up as well.
“Rob and Ryan have always supported [manager] Phil [Parkinson]’s ambition. We will be active in the transfer market during January, because we’re in a position of strength,” Harvey said at an event this week, via Wales Online.
“If we go any further forward from where we are now, we get promoted, and that is the objective. It’s difficult to say what and where, because there’s still six weeks to go before the window opens.
“Then it is a case of who’s available, and who will actually strengthen us. We’ve had a policy of trying to ensure that we sign players, not just for this division, but for the next division as well.”
Harvey is even hopeful that Wrexham will no longer be stung for premium contracts, having previously been forced to pay over the odds to convince players to drop down divisions.
“Fortunately, it’s easier now with the higher we get in the leagues, because players never really wanted to drop down. We had to pay for that privilege and we called it the non-league tax,” he said.
“Where we are now is that there are players that would come to play for Wrexham in League One that would not play for any other club in that division. That’s what we’ve been able to create so I suspect we’ll be busy.”
League One is highly competitive this season, with only six points separating current leaders Wycombe Wanderers and sixth-place Barnsley in the last of the play-off berths.
Wrexham are also not alone in quickly rising towards the top of the division. Stockport County beat them to last season’s League Two title and are only one point behind after winning the game between the sides last weekend. Mansfield Town were also promoted and are within one win of the play-offs with at least two games in hand on the four teams immediately above them.