Welcome to Brummywood — Wrexham and Blues go head to head as their owners fight it out for fans
Welcome to Brummywood — Wrexham and Blues go head to head as their owners fight it out for fans
Plus, BBC HS2 article 'mistruths' claim
Dear Patchers — welcome to Monday and to Brummywood, the subject of today’s Big Story that explains all you need to know about the surprising sell-out derby that will take place in just a few hours’ time. More on that below, but first, a look back at Saturday’s story.
Catch up and coming up: At the weekend, freelance writer Dan Cave took a deep dive into the life and times of Cuddles, the Killer Whale who lived in Dudley Zoo in the 1970s. “What a story!” and “How interesting!” were a couple of comments from happy readers. Catch up on the tale here:
This week, in our Wednesday read, Alex Taylor will try to find out how much — if any — money a non-profit Birmingham pub donates to local charities and on Thursday, Ophira Gottlieb will get inside the region’s canal boat community. On Saturday, Kate’s story will catch up with the campaigners fighting for racial diversity on juries in the wake of 14-year-old Dea-John Reid’s killing.
“We all need real journalism written by real people about real matters that concern us all.” — Dispatch member.
Bright and Breezy
☀️Tuesday: Bright and sunny with a gentle breeze. Max 20°C.
🌥️Wednesday: Cloudy, giving way to sun. Max 20°C.
⛅Thursday: Overcast until the sun breaks through. Max 19°C.
⛅Friday: Same story — more cloud, followed by more sun. Max 20°C.
☀️Weekend: Warm, dry and sunny — just how we like it. Max 20°C.
We get our weather from the Met Office.
Big story: Welcome to Brummywood — Wrexham and Blues go head to head as their owners fight it out for fans
Top line: Birmingham City Football Club will take on Wrexham A.F.C tonight in a hotly anticipated match. However, the competition is about more than just the beautiful game — both clubs are owned by celebrities desperate to create American fans of English football. Tonight’s game has been dubbed the ‘Hollywood Derby’.
Context: American National Football League (NFL) star Tom Brady became a co-owner of Blues in August last year in partnership with swish U.S. investment firm Knighthead Capital Management. Their takeover saw significant changes at the club from an expensive refurb-and-rebrand of St Andrew’s stadium (now called St Andrews @ Knighthead Park) to fireworks and loaded mac ‘n’ cheese at matches. Welsh club Wrexham was bought by Hollywood stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney in 2020.
Celebrity spat: Until now, Wrexham and Blues have had very little to do with each other. The flurry of interest in tonight’s game is as much, if not more, to do with the battle between their respective, flashy owners than the sport itself. The two sides have lost no opportunity to stir things up either — Brady’s longtime NFL rival Eli Manning has publicly backed Wrexham, taking to X to bait the Blues frontman who he beat twice in the US Super Bowl. “Now I can beat @TomBrady in football and fútbol! Go @Wrexham_AFC!” he posted. In retaliation, Brady recorded a video brandishing one of seven Lombardi trophies he has for winning the NFL championship. “See you Monday!” he said.
Posh n Wrex: If the rumours are true, Brady won’t be the only famous face in the stands — David Beckham is thought to be attending the match which kicks off at 8pm.
Yankee invasion: Stateside involvement in English football has become something of a phenomenon. As journalist Richard Sutcliffe points out in The Athletic, 22 of the English Football League’s (EFL) 72 members now have investors from across the pond. 14 of those have accepted new investment since Wrexham’s takeover.
Small screen inspiration: The deciding factor for Rob McElhenney? Watching Netflix docuseries Sunderland ‘Til I Die. Last year, Wrexham’s executive director Humphrey Ker told The atlantic: “Rob’s telling me how the show had him in tears one minute, then jumping out of his seat the next.”
One city, two teams: As for Knighthead co-chairman, he told the Telegraph that Birmingham City needs to get back in the premier league so the team can return to playing against longtime rivals Aston Villa. He said the “two spectacular football clubs” should be “battling it out against each other every year”.
Football fandom: The glitz and glamour surrounding the teams’ owners seems to have had a commercial impact. Birmingham City chief exec Garry Cook told BBC Sport: “Here we are in League One and this is the only game on TV on Monday. We sold out of tickets very quickly.” But for the Americans — and Reynolds who is from Canada —, the goal is to grab as many stateside fans as possible. From Sutcliffe’s article:
In a recent report titled Connecting and Winning U.S. Fandoms: A Guidebook For European Clubs, fan data specialists CLV Group suggest that 36million U.S.-based soccer fans — or 44 per cent — are still undecided on which team to support. The group’s CEO Neil Joyce estimates a potential $1.1billion is up for grabs.
According to Joyce, to ensure Birmingham City makes a splash in Birmingham Alabama (and all over the U.S.A) Tom Brady should bring fans from his other sports investments along for the ride. These include NFL team Las Vegas Raiders and womens’ basketball team the Las Vegas Aces.
Bottom line: Still, for fans closer to home, the most important thing tonight will be the game. Blues have suffered a series of knockbacks and several managerial shifts, including a stint by Wayne Rooney who failed to prevent the team’s relegation to the third tier. The club recently appointed ex-Tottenham Hotspur assistant boss Chris Davies to the hot seat, who spent £30m signing 17 new players in a bid to improve their fortunes. Tonight will be a big test to see if Blues can make a great American comeback.
Photo of the week
Birmingham photographer Marcin Sz recently captured this fantastic shot looking up Pinfold Street at dawn.
Brum in Brief
🚂Plans for HS2 north replacement unveiled: Mayors Richard Parker and Andy Burnham have revealed their proposal to construct a new 50-mile railway line — a cheaper and slower alternative to the HS2 line that was axed by former-PM Rishi Sunak last year. The plans were the brainchild of Burnham and former-West Mids mayor Andy Street and when they were first publicised, Parker was less than enthusiastic. He posted on X at the time: “When HS2 was cancelled Andy Street said ‘the Government had taken our future away.’ This won’t get it back. Only a Labour Mayor working with a Labour Government will get our future back.” However, since taking office, he has backed a consortium of private sector organisations who say “the new line has the potential to deliver “roughly 85% of the benefits of HS2 Phase 2 at 60-75% of the cost”. Find out more.
🥊Rail expert hits out at BBC HS2 coverage: A BBC Panorama article about HS2 overspending has raised the hackles of rail engineer and writer Gareth Dennis. He told The Dispatch the story “states a collection of frequently repeated mistruths about the project and its purposes, as well as some railway engineering myths”. The article by Richard Bilton outlines how the project “blew billions” of taxpayer money because achieving high speeds meant building very straight tracks through green areas — resulting in a demand for expensive tunnels and cuttings to keep the trains out of sight. Dennis took aim at the right-leaning “think tanks” and their influence in the media. Journalist Andrew Gilligan, HS2 critic who works for conservative think tank Policy Exchange and was former transport advisor to Boris Johnson and Sunak, is quoted by the BBC. Dennis says: “The Panorama piece contains no new information, no new stories, and is coming at a time when the Labour government is considering its options for how to progress the scheme.”
📱Midlands Secondary Schools Become First to Announce Phones Ban: One of the largest academy chains in the country, Ormiston Academies Trust, has banned students from using their phones in plans that affect eight Birminghm schools. It follows growing concerns regarding the impact phone use has on mental health, concentration and behaviour. Any young Dispatch fans out there — you’ll have to start saving these Monday briefings until after the bell rings. Full Story.
🏅The George Eliot Fellowship Essay Prize: The George Eliot Fellowship’s annual competition for a previously unpublished paper about the Victorian novelist’s life or works is open. Anyone can enter and the winning essayist will receive a cash prize of £500, a two-year honorary membership to the Fellowship and publication in the 2025 George Eliot Review. More information.
Home of the week
This three-bedroom Harborne cottage feels like stepping back in time. There’s a large garden and a cellar that’s ripe for conversion too. It’s available for (a very Harborne price of) £500,000.
Media picks
📰Former Blue Peter presenter Ayo Akinwolere gave an interesting interview to The Times about his life in the spotlight and how he manages his wealth. Akinwolere moved to Birmingham from Nigeria in 1991 at the age of eight. He reflects on being sacked from his first job working in a shop after he showed up hungover and had to run to the bathroom to be sick, leaving the till open and unattended. “I came back to find the manager looking at the till and then at me. He said you can’t stay. I had to explain it all to my mum.” Read it here.
🎧The Rest is History Podcast had an interesting mini-series about the life of J.R.R. Tolkien. In the first of two episodes: hosts Tom Holland — no, not that one — and Dominic Sandbrook explore Tolkien's childhood, his sudden relocation to a house where the Chinese pagoda roundabout now stands, and the impact that the rapidly changing English countryside had on the creation of Middle Earth. Listen here.
📺Watch Channel 4’s coverage of the ParalympicsGB homecoming. With a total of 124 medals, the paralympic team finished second overall at Paris 2024. The teams’ successes were celebrated at Birmingham’s Utilita Arena, with performers including Craig David, Aitch, Sugababes and Jonas Blue. Presenters of The Last Leg — Adam Hills, Josh Widdicombe and Alex Brooker — hosted the event which aired on Saturday evening. Watch here.
Things to do
Tuesday
🎲Art History Festival 2024 is providing free events all week around the theme ‘local to global’. This online talk about how 19th Century board games helped to create an image of the world and brought it into millions of homes, sounds fascinating.
🎭Aber Comedy Fest — on Tour. If you’re in need of a laugh head down to the Birmingham MAC. Featuring some of the best acts from Aberystwyth Comedy Festival. Starting at 7.30pm, tickets are available from £10.
Wednesday
🪄Add some midweek magic with The Magic Room. It’s the Lichfield show’s one-year anniversary, and it promises a captivating evening of mystery, elegance and wonder. Starts at 7.30pm, tickets available from £11.55.
📖Bestselling author and historian, William Dalrymple has released a new book The Golden Road: How ancient India transformed the world. He’ll be discussing his work — the ways in which India's ideas and influences have shaped Eurasia — at Waterstones at 6.30pm. Tickets available from £5.
Thursday
🎬Outdoor cinema: Back to the Future. For one night only, there will be drinks, street food and sci-fi DJs transforming the Innovation Birmingham Campus into an alfresco cinema. Hop in your DeLorean and head down. Tickets available from £5.
🛋️Want to make your home look like it’s been spruced up by a professional interior designer? Head to The Plough in Harborne and learn from expert Mel Spencer at 7pm. Tickets are selling fast — and the £35 fee includes wine and nibbles.
Swish Knighthead Capital are rather in the doo doo with their investments in the US arm. Birmingham City are owned by their Cayman Island annuities business so Mr Wagner is a manager of a fund that owns Birmingham not the owner himself. There has been some disquiet among the regulators in the US over annuity companies with these types of investments particularly since the 777 partners debacle (Everton, various European clubs). What is for sure is that Mr Wagner will have to do a lot of money raising for his sports quarter/stadium plan as it's beyond the means/risk metrics of the annuities business.