Wrexham

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Birmingham City boss Chris Davies says he was pleased how his side did not get distracted by the hype of the ‘Hollywood derby’ against Wrexham.

He said the profile brought out the best of the promotion favourites as they inflicted a first defeat of the season on Phil Parkinson’s men.

Monday’s clash at St Andrew’s was a test of the two early pace-setters in League One, but gained huge extra attention because of the A-list nature of the club’s respective ownerships.

It is something Wrexham have become used to since being taken over by actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney in 2021.

But Davies praised his players for following the Dragons’ example in getting on with the job as he praised Parkinson’s "honest, hard-working" team after Blues’ comfortable 3-1 win.

Asked about the extra focus with McElhenney, Birmingham minority owner Tom Brady and ex-England captain David Beckham all in attendance, Davies, a former Wales youth international and Swansea City coach, said: “I really don’t pay any attention to that stuff.

"I had no idea what was going on and who was going to be here because that’s not my domain. What's important is what we do on the pitch, in training and how we approach the games.

“I’m pleased for the club that we’ve had the right kind of attention that we deserve. But all that stuff for me is no interest.

“But it pleased me it didn’t distract the players. It was something I did address with them but that’s not our domain, our domain is the pitch and what we do. It’s about focussing on the performance and the external stuff is irrelevant to us.

"It’s true, they will follow things on social media and they’ll know the attention and hype around the game, but I didn’t see any change at all from a concentration point of view or any pressure or anything like.

“If anything it made us better because it was all-round our best performance of the season.”

Birmingham are now behind Wrexham on just goal difference following the win as they maintained their unbeaten start to the season.

But Davies – a former No 2 to Brendan Rodgers at Celtic and Leicester City – played down the early-season significance adding: “We will not get carried away because, as we’ve seen already, this is a really difficult league and anyone who thinks it’s easy, they don’t understand the challenge ahead of us.

“Wrexham have had a very good start to the campaign, they’ve obviously built momentum from promotion, they know how to win and you could see here they have very honest players who will work hard, and are a club that’s invested a lot of money and have big ambitions, but we will focus on ourselves.

“My job is to make sure the players enjoy this and feel the confidence they should from it, but understand they still have a challenge.”

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Midfielder George Dobson says Wrexham’s defeat at Birmingham City was just a “minor blip” to their League One season.

The 3-1 defeat was the Dragons’ first league loss of the campaign, in front of a crowd of nearly 30,000 at St. Andrew’s.

Wrexham are still top of the table and host Crawley Town on Saturday.

“We’ve got to take a bit of perspective from here,” said Dobson after the game.

“Today is just one game. Now we bounce back on Saturday and go again because we have had a really good start and one game where we were not quite there isn't going to change that.

“They [Birmingham] are the best team in the division by a country mile. You don't spend the amount of money they've spent without having really good players, so it was a really tough test but it's one we will dissect, one we will learn from, and we'll take it into Saturday and take it into the rest of the season.

“We've had some really tough games already and we've got some really good results so it's just a minor blip.”

The game at St. Andrew’s was billed as the battle of the star owners, with Wrexham’s Hollywood duo Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney up against NFL legend and Birmingham minority owner Tom Brady.

“For us it was just another game,” added Dobson.

“It was a really enjoyable game to play and you don't get many like that, but we’ll just move again and hopefully bounce back on Saturday, put in a strong performance and hopefully get three points and then tonight will be forgotten.”

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Rotherham United manager Steve Evans has described Wrexham as League One’s answer to the Harlem Globetrotters.

Rotherham are 15th in the third tier having won only one of their first five league games of the season, but are viewed by some as possible promotion contenders following their relegation from the Championship last season.

Evans was asked how Rotherham measure up against some the other sides who are viewed as promotion candidates, and compared Wrexham to the Globetrotters, the American exhibition basketball team.

"We've not played the Real Madrid of League One - we play them a week on Saturday [when Birmingham visit the New York Stadium],” he said.

“And we've not played the Harlem Globetrotters, who will turn up when Parky (Phil Parkinson) brings Wrexham here with the stars that come with the ownership there.”

Evans said Rotherham are “getting there as a team” after losing some influential players over the summer, among them midfielder Ollie Rathbone, who joined Wrexham last month.

"The standards at the top of this league are going to be quite awesome at the end of the season," Evans added on Rotherham’s website.

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Waynne Phillips believes Paul Mullin has put himself in contention for a first league start of the season at Birmingham City thanks to his EFL Trophy goal against Salford City.

Mullin scored his first goal of 2024-25 as Wrexham beat Salford 2-1 at the Stok Racecourse on Tuesday, curling the ball home in spectacular fashion from outside the area.

The goal came in the striker’s first start of the campaign after a recovering from surgery on a back injury.

Mullin has made three substitute appearances in League One so far this term, but former Wrexham midfielder Phillips is keen to see the 29-year-old get more game-time in the third tier.

“Paul Mullin is special,” he told BBC Radio Wales Breakfast.

“I am looking forward to seeing him at League One level.

“The two strikers at the moment in the first team, Jack Marriott and Ollie Palmer, have done ever so well.

“Paul Mullin may have to wait a bit longer before he gets a starting place, but he has put himself right in the frame with that goal.”

The Salford victory was a fourth in succession for Wrexham, who are top of the table having taken 13 points from their first five league games this season.

They face fourth-placed Birmingham, the pre-season title favourites, in a mouthwatering game on Monday night.

The Salford victory came despite boss Phil Parkinson making 11 changes to the side which beat Shrewsbury Town 3-0 last weekend.

“He gave players much-needed game-time – Paul Mullin being one of them,” Phillips added.

“I think it was important that he got 70 minutes under his belt to put himself in the frame for what is a massive game at Birmingham next week.”

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Paul Mullin marked his first start of the season with his first goal of the campaign as Wrexham saw off visitors Salford City in their first match of the EFL Trophy group stage.

The striker, Wrexham's top scorer last season, has been eased back into action so far after undergoing minor spinal surgery at the end of last season - coming off the bench in three League One encounters.

Mullin took just 18 minutes to leave his mark, cutting inside onto his left foot before curling an amazing strike from just outside the box into the far top corner.

The 29-year-old added a cheeky celebration, briefly donning his 'Welshpool' mask from the sidelines - part of his costume in a cameo appearance in the film 'Deadpool & Wolverine' starring Wrexham co-owner Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman.

Matty Lund almost equalised for the visitors before half-time but was denied by Callum Burton's great save.

Salford were back on level terms early in the second half after Conor McAleny was set up by Hakeeb Adelakun.

Mullin nearly restored the lead when his shot rebounded off the crossbar, before being replaced by Ollie Palmer up front for the hosts.

Wrexham won it with seven minutes of normal time left as Will Boyle soared highest at the back post to head in Seb Revan's delivery.

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Ollie Rathbone spoke of the “really special” atmosphere at the Stok Racecourse after making his first league start for Wrexham.

A crowd of 13,341 – Wrexham’s highest home attendance since 1980 – saw Phil Parkinson’s side go top of the League One table with a 3-0 win over Shrewsbury Town.

“I’ve played quite a lot of games at this level now and atmospheres like that don’t come along very often,” Rathbone said.

“It’s why I came to the club – it’s a special time to be a part of it.”

Wrexham, playing in English football’s third tier for the first time in 19 years following promotion last season, are unbeaten after five games.

But midfielder Rathbone, a summer signing from Rotherham United, is not surprised by Wrexham’s start to the season.

“It can’t be underestimated how big a step up this is but with the squad of players I don’t think you can expect much less to be fair.

“After five league games you have a taste of what the league offers in a lot of different ways and I think we’ve handled everything really well.

“We won’t get ahead of ourselves but we’ve played Bolton away, Peterborough away – two teams that have been in the play-offs the last couple of years – and I think we performed really well against both of them.

“In the home games we’ve done just our job.”