Compared: Leeds United, 49ers’ net worth vs USA-owned Wrexham and Birmingham City
Peterborough United previously chairman Darragh MacAnthony used Leeds United in an argument to downplay the growth of Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney’s Wrexham, as the Welsh side look to compete with Birmingham City at the top end of League One.
Leeds have been the biggest attraction in the EFL in every season they have been outside of the Premier League, but there are a number of big clubs aiming to replicate the stature of some of the giants seen in the tiers below the Premier League.
A newer powerhouse in the lower divisions have been Wrexham, taken over by Hollywood’s Rob McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds, they are pushing for triple back-to-back promotions up to the Championship this season.
Peterborough owner MacAnthony shares Leeds statement in Wrexham diss
American ownership in the EFL is becoming a significant talking-point as Tom Wagner and Tom Brady’s Birmingham City beat Reynolds and McElhenney’s Wrexham this week, a significant televised spectacle with celebrities aplenty in the crowd
The very same weekend, Leeds had Hollywood icon Will Ferrell in attendance as the Whites were beaten by Burnley.
Elsewhere in League One, Peterborough United chairman Darragh MacAnthony has always been vocal on social media and provided a lot of clarity on how he sees a variety of things in football, landing him a regular spot on talkSPORT.
His take on Wrexham wasn’t a positive one after seeing the Welsh side gain an enormous amount of coverage compared to their EFL counterparts, which MacAnthony is fed up of.
Speaking in April on talkSPORT, he said this:
“Fair play to them, they bought in and came up with a project and they’ve managed to finance this project by selling documentaries, advertising and doing deals with skincare companies, drink companies where they’ve had to put very little of their own dough in.
“Anyone who comes in and has a couple of promotions and increases and grows their crowd – I saw their revenues the other day and it was £15-£20 million a year now as opposed to £5 million when they first came in. Anyone who does that is a successful person at what they do.
“They put some decent people in – I watched the Wrexham documentary and it was quite good, the first season and a half then peters out like a lot of sports documentaries do. The only thing that irritates me about the whole Wrexham thing isn’t Wrexham themselves – I have a lot of admiration for Wrexham, the owners, the people behind the scenes – it’s the media. You open a newspaper and there’s stuff about the Championship, League One and League Two, but every week there’s stuff about Wrexham and it’s nauseating.
“You get why they’re doing it because they want an American audience but at the end of the day there are 72 EFL clubs out there. They need to calm down thinking they’re bigger than Leeds or whoever.”
Here, we look at comparative net worths of the three clubs and their owners after MacAnthony’s passionate rant…
