Wrexham: 'Sky's the limit' for star-owned club targeting back-to-back promotions
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Executive director of Wrexham AFC Humphrey Ker (right) and advisor to the board Shaun Harvey (left) were brought to the club alongside owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney
Wrexham executive director Humphrey Ker believes the club can repeat promotion success in League Two next season.
The club, owned by Hollywood actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, ended a 15-year EFL exile with Saturday's 3-1 victory against Boreham Wood.
After celebrating the National League title they have set their sights high.
"We feel the sky's the limit for Wrexham because you look at the crowds we had in the stadium all season," said Ker.
"You look at the crowds that were outside the stadium [on Saturday], people that couldn't get a ticket that just wanted to be in town and close to the stadium and close to the action."
Wrexham have averaged crowds of around 10,000 at the Racecourse Stadium during a record-breaking campaign, and they have already started work on a new 5,500-seat stand which will increase the capacity to around 15,600.
Reynolds and McElhenney's involvement has also seen the club introduced to an international audience through the successful Welcome to Wrexham documentary series.
"I think our full-time announcement yesterday [for Saturday's win against Boreham Wood], the last time I checked, had 15 million views on Twitter," added Ker.
"The interest in this club is astronomical and we believe that the squad that we have right now, we have a very strong chance of going up again next year.
"It gets more challenging the further up the pyramid we go, but we have real faith and confidence in the people we've got in the football club to take us in the right direction.
"We want to do this again, we want to be having these parties next year and as many summers after that as we can possibly manage."
'This is a special town and a special club'
A place people want to play football
Ker's optimism for next season is not just based on a National League season that has delivered a record number of wins and points. The club also reached the fourth round of the FA Cup, beating Championship Coventry City before losing a replay to a Sheffield United side pushing for promotion back to the Premier League.
They have attracted a number of players from higher division clubs, including top scorer Paul Mullin who joined from Cambridge United in 2021, while ex-England goalkeeper Ben Foster came out of retirement to help Wrexham's promotion push and has admitted he is considering prolonging his career.
The club also hope future recruitment will be easier having returned to the Football League for the first time since 2008.
"Our mission will always be to try and get the best players we possibly can for each situation," Ker told the BBC Radio Wales Breakfast programme.
"I think previously we've had to pay a bit of a premium to get players to come down to the National League because of the stigma that surrounds non-League or Conference football, however you want to describe it, and as we go up we'll have less of a challenge in attracting people.
"I know that Phil [manager Parkinson] and Les Read, who's been helping us as well on the recruitment side, are just inundated with incoming calls from players because this is a place that people want to come and play football."
Ker also dismissed suggestions that having gained promotion from the National League, Wrexham could fall foul of much stricter financial rules which govern sides in the EFL.
Under the League's Salary Cost Management Protocol (SMCP) League Two clubs can spend a maximum of 55% of their turnover on wages.
"The salary caps and things that exist, or the spending caps, are tied to your revenue," said Ker.
"What you can't have is just rich owners coming in and paying massively over the odds and operating at gigantic losses.
"Now we actually generate an extraordinary amount of revenue because of the interest in the team and because of the merchandising, so to be honest with you we're not losing too much sleep about that, I think we'll fall well within the boundaries of what we are permitted to spend.
"We also look at this team and think this is a team that beat Coventry City, that ran Sheffield United very close over two [games]. We've accrued a record number of points in the National League this year, we think we're ready to go again with some minor changes."
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