The cameras haven’t stopped rolling in North Wales for a while now. What began as a romantic rescue act by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney has turned Wrexham from a non-league curiosity into a fully-fledged global storyline, with the Racecourse Ground as its main set.
The National League slog is gone. In its place: Championship football, packed houses, and a club that no longer feels like a stepping stone, but a destination. The ambition is clear. This isn’t a project content with survival in the second tier. The script they’re chasing ends in the Premier League.
And if they get there, some believe they’ll need a player who looks and feels like a leading man.
‘The Hollywood signing for Wrexham’
Former Republic of Ireland international and pundit Damien Barry sees the club’s unique profile as a powerful weapon in the transfer market. With “Welcome to Wrexham” beaming the club’s story into living rooms around the world, the Red Dragons can offer something most Championship sides simply can’t: global attention.
Barry thinks that spotlight changes the type of player Wrexham can realistically target over the next few years – and he has one name at the top of his wishlist.
Speaking to BOYLE Sports, Barry said: “The Hollywood link brings that extra attraction to the club, players will have extra interest in going and playing there. I certainly think it's an amazing story if they can get promotion and that would change the players they are looking at, but it might be too soon for them. Jack Grealish is definitely the Hollywood signing for Wrexham. If they can pull that off, it would be the perfect signing for them."
That’s not a throwaway line. In Barry’s eyes, Grealish isn’t just another big name. He’s the statement, the emblem of a new era – the kind of marquee arrival that tells the rest of the league Wrexham are no longer just a nice story, but a serious Premier League operation.
Grealish at a crossroads
The timing is intriguing. Grealish is expected to leave Manchester City permanently this summer once his loan at Everton ends. At 30, with his Toffees campaign disrupted after 22 Premier League appearances by injury, he stands at a career crossroads.
He’s tasted the top, lived inside the pressure cooker of elite English football, and carried the weight of expectation at both club and international level. For a player of his personality – expressive, front-facing, never far from the headlines – the idea of stepping into a club where the cameras are part of the furniture might not be a deterrent. It might be a draw.
Barry certainly thinks the Wrexham environment could suit him, if the club keeps climbing.
"Who knows what's going to happen with Jack," he added. "His move to Everton was only a loan. I'm not too sure how long he has left on his contract. But yeah, who knows where Jack wants to play. If he wants that Wrexham level of attention, it's a conversation maybe."
That’s the key: attention. Wrexham cannot yet compete with the financial muscle of the established Premier League elite, but they can offer a different kind of stage – one where a player like Grealish wouldn’t just be another star in a galaxy, he’d be the face on the poster.
Promotion first, fantasy later
For now, it remains exactly what Barry calls it: a conversation. A possibility, not a plan.
The hard reality is that a move of this magnitude only becomes remotely feasible if Wrexham complete the next chapters of their ascent. The owners have never hidden their ambition. The Premier League isn’t a dream whispered behind closed doors; it’s the stated destination. To thrive there, they would eventually need established international calibre, the kind of players who can walk into a top-flight dressing room and raise standards instantly.
Phil Parkinson’s side are still fighting to earn that right. Wrexham sit seventh in the Championship, with 63 points from 39 games, six points off the top three. The margins are tight, the stakes obvious. Finish in the top two and they go straight up. Miss out, and the play-offs become their high-wire act.
Every point now is a step towards the kind of future where the phrase “Jack Grealish to Wrexham” stops sounding like fantasy and starts feeling like a negotiation.
The story has already defied enough conventions to make anything seem possible in North Wales. The question is simple: can Wrexham climb quickly enough for a player of Grealish’s stature to see the Racecourse Ground not as a cameo, but as his next starring role?
