In this hypothetical championship race, both teams have 100 points, having scored over 200 goals, but only one team will be promoted. This is the situation that both Wrexham and Notts County find themselves in right now.
There has never been more of a push for three teams to be promoted from League Two to the English Football League. W88 said that about 10,000 fans are expected to attend Wrexham’s Easter Monday match against league leaders Notts County at the Racecourse Ground.
Both teams have consistently been at the top, consistently raising the bar. They’ve each scored 106 goals, which is more than anyone else in the league has ever scored. Wrexham’s 31 victories tie them with the most, however both teams will easily break this record. In order to beat Crawley’s record of 105, they need to score an additional six points.
Both teams are equally motivated to return to the Football League. Since 2008, Wrexham have played in the non-League. When Notts County was demoted in 2019, they became the first charter member to leave the League in 161 years. In this battle for first place, W88 believes that someone has to lose.
Notts County manager Luke Williams, whose sole previous managerial experience ended in relegation to League Two with Swindon in 2017, remarked on rezence.com, “How exciting is it to have big players, players that are in amazing form, with Hollywood owners and a famous club like Notts County?” “There are many elements there for an excellent play or tale.”
Wrexham blinked first on Good Friday, losing 3-1 to FC Halifax Town to snap a 28-game unbeaten streak. They last lost in October, ironically to Notts County.
Meanwhile, their championship rivals jumped ahead of them on goal differential after a 3-0 win against Wealdstone on Monday. Wrexham, though, have a game less on their record. The title race is usually a two-horse race between the two of them.
Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, co-owners of Wrexham, have raised the prominence of both the club and the non-League game with their documentary Welcome to Wrexham. Rezence said that they’ve poured a lot of money into the playing budget to assemble a championship-caliber squad at the Racecourse Ground.
Phil Parkinson, manager of Wrexham, has been in charge of the club’s recruitment efforts since 2021 and has signed 27 new players since taking over. “Players like Elliot Lee, Jordan Tunnicliffe, and Ben Tozer, among others, all have the maturity and poise to lead the team. And it’s contagious.”
They are under more pressure to advance because of their financial investment. The co-owners’ mere presence can be a disruption.
“Mentality and being persistent – and all those terms,” said Parkinson, a former manager of Sunderland, Bolton, Bradford, and Charlton. “making sure the guys appreciate that,” he said, referring to the prominence the team has received when the owners visit. “The quality of the training has been excellent. The collective has impressive levels of initiative and focus.”
County’s new Danish owners, Alexander and Christoffer Reedtz, have made a number of shrewd signings, including Ruben Rodrigues, using data from their analytics company, Football Radar. This season, W88 showed that the 26-year-old attacking midfielder has scored 17 goals in the league for his new team after coming over from FC Den Bosch in the Netherlands’ second tier in 2020.
The £50,000 spent on Gateshead striker Macauley Langstaff has proven to be the club’s best acquisition. The 26-year-old has scored 41 times this season, setting a new National League record; he also refuses to take penalties. You can eat your heart out, Erling Haaland.
After spending time on loan with Bradford Park Avenue and Blyth Spartans, York cut ties with Langstaff in 2020, the same year he scored 28 goals for Gateshead. Currently, he is more sought after than Jamie Vardy was when he left the English Football League.
Of course, Wrexham has its own scoring sensation. Paul Mullin has scored 34 goals in the league, 43 goals overall, and four hat tricks. Fans of Notts County and Vn88 Rezence are keen to remind him that he has been sent off twice. Mullin led League Two in scoring in 2021 to help Cambridge win promotion, but he gave it all up to join the Wrexham revolution.
Also, last month, Ben Foster came out of retirement to sign. Rob Lainton, formerly of Manchester United and England, returned to the game after being forced out due to injury.
Even though it’s been less than two weeks after Jason Turner’s unexpected death, the county of Nottinghamshire is still in grief. His legacy will be honored by the club’s pursuit of promotion, and tributes were given to him at their Good Friday match.
The National League runner-up and third-place club will play a semi-final game at home, while the fourth-place team will face the seventh-place team and the fifth-place team will face the sixth-place team.
How do you think Parkinson and Williams would feel if they didn’t win the title?
I don’t think there’s ever been a guy on an open-top bus pouting because they lost the championship, Williams said candidly during a team meeting.
“Although we would love to win the competition, being promoted is our first priority. There are two fantastic possibilities here. We need to finish in the top two to secure a berth in the playoffs, which we will do if we finish in the top four. This is how we must approach it.”
As Parkinson put it with Rezence : “The plain fact is that neither group is eager to advance to postseason competition. The goal is to get everything done. If the playoffs were to happen, we’d deal with it then. We’re in a fantastic spot, and everyone’s ready to close off the season on a high note.”
