What Wrexham AFC Can Teach Us About Leadership

A Club at a Crossroads

Picture a football club so old it predates the light bulb, the telephone, and the automobile. Wrexham AFC was formed in 1864 in the back room of a pub called the Turf Hotel, making it the third-oldest professional football club on the planet. For over a century, the club was the beating heart of a small Welsh town, home to an FA Cup upset over Arsenal when Arsenal were the reigning English champions, a stadium that hosted Wales' first home international and is still the oldest international ground in use anywhere in the world, and generations of supporters who never once considered following anyone else.

Then it nearly died.

Wrexham crashed into administration in 2004, spent years fighting off a property developer who tried to take its stadium, and was relegated out of the English Football League in 2008. It bottomed out in the fifth tier of English football, a level so far from the spotlight that most fans of the sport couldn't have told you it existed. In 2011, with the club on the brink of extinction, its own supporters raised over £100,000 in a matter of hours to fund their own takeover bid. For nearly a decade, the fans themselves ran the club, out of loyalty and little else.

This is the club that two Hollywood actors bought, without getting to set foot in Wrexham because of the pandemic, approved by the fans in November 2020 and completed the following February. What happened next is the backstory as they enter the 2026-27 season with another U.S. Summer Tour underway.

When Ryan Reynolds was asked in an interview what he and Rob Mac had gotten right, he waved the question off. This isn't a TED Talk, he said, and neither of them wanted to pretend they knew all the answers for all of it. They are building in real time and appreciate someone who is willing to say “I don’t know the answer yet” and then go and figure out the best solution.

Fair enough—what follows isn't their leadership philosophy. It's what the record shows they did.

The Comeback

Reynolds and Mac inherited an institution with a broken business model and a fanbase that had every reason to distrust outsiders. Five years and three consecutive promotions later, Wrexham sits in the Championship, one step from the Premier League, the first men's club in English football history to climb from the National League to the second tier in three straight seasons. Last season, they finished seventh, two points off the playoffs in the Championship and the club's best league finish in 162 years. On the heels of World Cup fever on July 29, 2026, they faced Liverpool, one of the most iconic football clubs in the world, at Yankee Stadium.

It's a story that reads like a movie because, in a sense, it is one. The docuseries Welcome to Wrexham captured the whole climb start to finish, and if you haven't seen it yet, it's worth the watch. But underneath the Hollywood gloss is something more useful to us: a genuine leadership case study, playing out in real time, in front of cameras that don't blink.

Leadership in Motion

Great leadership stories deserve a second look because they reveal patterns that often go unnoticed in real time.

Over the past several years, Virtuosi League has worked alongside hundreds of senior executives to better understand those patterns to identify the enduring practices that consistently separate exceptional leaders from merely successful ones. Those observations became the foundation of the LEAP Six Pillars of Leadership.

What makes Wrexham AFC such a compelling case study goes beyond its extraordinary rise from the fifth tier of English football to the Championship. The club's transformation illustrates all six leadership practices working together. Reynolds and Mac would likely be the first to say they weren't following a leadership framework, which is beside the point. Leadership is revealed through the decisions we make, the behaviors we model, and the culture we create over time. Here's how we see it through that lens.

Pillar 1 | Reinforce Your Foundation

Lead from Purpose Before Position

One of Reynolds and Mac's first leadership decisions had nothing to do with football; it was a decision about identity.

From the beginning, they consistently described themselves as stewards of Wrexham AFC rather than owners. At first glance, the distinction may seem semantic. In reality, it established the philosophy that would shape every decision that followed.

A steward accepts responsibility for something that existed long before their arrival and is meant to endure long after they leave. That mindset shifts leadership away from personal achievement and toward institutional legacy. Throughout the club's transformation, investments in the Racecourse Ground, the academy, and the surrounding community were positioned as commitments to strengthening the club for generations to come rather than monuments to new ownership.

It's easier for people to place trust in leaders whose actions consistently reveal what they value. That is the work of Reinforce Your Foundation, because before leaders define a vision, they define themselves. Purpose, values, and character are the foundation upon which every subsequent decision rests.

Discover how these Virtuosi Voices contributors make a practice of reinforcing their foundations: Kimberly Evans Paige • Tariq Hassan • William White • Zena Arnold • Ursula Mejía-Melgar

Pillar 2 | Understand the Landscape

Earn the Right to Create Change

Leadership identity begins with who we are, but true transformation with understanding what we have been entrusted to lead.

Before introducing meaningful change, Reynolds and Mac invested time learning the history of Wrexham, the resilience of its supporters, and the role the club played within the community. They recognized that they were becoming part of a 160-year-old institution whose identity extended far beyond the 90 minutes played each weekend.

That understanding influenced their investment priorities down through the way they engaged supporters and local leaders. Long before success appeared on the league table, they demonstrated respect for the people, traditions, and culture that sustained the club through its most difficult years.

Exceptional leaders understand that every organization has its own ecosystem: its history, culture, relationships, and unwritten rules. They resist the temptation to arrive with answers before they have developed genuine understanding.

Transformation begins with curiosity. Leaders earn the right to create change by first demonstrating respect for what already exists.

Examine how these leaders interpret and approach Understand the Landscape: Andrea Perez • Eric Schwartz • Rebecca Messina • Michelle Hagen • Rishad Tobaccowala

Pillar 3 | Clear the Path

Replace Uncertainty with Clarity

Few organizations willingly expose their struggles. Wrexham did the opposite.

Welcome to Wrexham gave supporters unprecedented access to difficult conversations, disappointing losses, financial realities, and the emotional complexity of rebuilding a historic club. Rather than undermining confidence, that transparency strengthened it because supporters understood not only what decisions were being made and why.

The lesson extends well beyond documentary filmmaking.

Leadership is about helping people make sense of complexity. During periods of uncertainty, teams look to leaders to provide context, establish priorities, and reduce unnecessary ambiguity. While uncertainty itself cannot always be eliminated, confusion often can.

Clarity is one of leadership's greatest responsibilities because people are remarkably resilient when they understand what they are being asked to navigate.

Learn how these leaders (including Nadine) create clarity, alignment, and direction to Clear the Path: Kellyn Smith Kenny • Danielle Lee • Kory Marchisotto • Najoh Tita-Reid 

Pillar 4 | Strengthen Your Teams

Create the Conditions for Others to Excel

Reynolds and Mac understood the limits of their own expertise from the very beginning.

Rather than attempting to become football experts themselves, they hired accomplished leaders who already were. Former player and respected manager Phil Parkinson was entrusted with football operations. Experienced executives such as Shaun Harvey and Michael Williamson strengthened the club's business leadership. Just as importantly, ownership resisted the temptation to interfere. Their responsibility was to create an environment where the right people could make better decisions than they could.

That distinction separates management from leadership. Exceptional leaders understand that their long-term impact is measured by the capabilities they cultivate in others. They know when to lead from the front, when to lead alongside, and when to step back entirely so others can thrive.

The strongest teams are built by leaders who make others, not themselves, indispensable. These leaders are exceptionally talented at strengthening their teams: David Edelman • Nick Tran • Vineet Mehra • William White

Pillar 5 | Build Bridges

Turn Shared Belief into Shared Momentum

As Wrexham's ambitions grew, so did the network of people and organizations invested in its success.

Supporters, employees, sponsors, investors, civic leaders, global brands, and media partners all found themselves contributing to the same story. Partnerships with organizations including TikTok, United Airlines, and Mozilla's Firefox reflected commercial opportunity as well as alignment around a shared vision that created value for every participant.

Leadership at scale requires exactly this kind of bridge-building. The most effective leaders connect people who might otherwise pursue separate objectives and create a common purpose compelling enough that collaboration becomes the natural choice. Momentum grows when individual interests become shared ambition.

Double-click into these ideas with some of the best leaders in the Virtuosi League community, who are known for building bridges to reinforce trust and get work done: Charisse Hughes • Daniel Cherry III • Ken Turner • Kenny Mitchell • Mark Weinstein

Pillar 6 | Fortify Resilience

Commit to the Long Game

It is tempting to describe Wrexham as an overnight success, but the record tells a different story.

The club's first full season under new ownership ended in playoff disappointment despite earning 88 points. It would have been easy to question the strategy, change direction, or search for faster results. Instead, leadership remained disciplined, continuing to invest in facilities, player development, organizational capability, and culture, trusting that thoughtful decisions would compound over time. They eventually did.

Three consecutive promotions later, Wrexham stands one step away from the Premier League because despite the setbacks, the organization remained committed to the plan when progress temporarily stalled.

Resilience is often misunderstood as simply enduring hardship. In practice, resilient leadership is the discipline to continue making thoughtful decisions when immediate results fail to reward them.

Learn from these leaders, who share the importance of building resilience before the storms hit to stay focused through challenging times: Craig Brommers • Deborah Wahl • Tim Ellis • Antonio Lucio

The Long Game

Wrexham's story is still unfolding, which is another reason it's such a valuable leadership case study.

The club's remarkable rise emerged from a series of deliberate choices that reinforced one another over time. Leadership began with identity. It deepened through understanding. It created clarity amid uncertainty, empowered capable people, aligned diverse stakeholders around a common purpose, and remained disciplined long enough for those decisions to compound.

That progression mirrors what we continue to observe across the leaders who shape the Virtuosi League community. While every leadership journey is unique, the practices that sustain exceptional leadership remain remarkably consistent.

The points on the scoreboard may be what captures our attention, but the leadership behind those results is what ultimately determines whether success endures.

These six pillars are the foundation of our LEAP Flagship program where we help seasoned leaders master their leadership skills. The Fall class kicks off September 22–25 at Carmel Valley Ranch, and space is still open. Inquire or apply today.