Wrexham FC Face Battle to Prevent History Repeating Itself

We’ve been here before haven’t we? It’s the end of April, the Champions League semi finals are upon us, the FA Cup final on the horizon, and Wrexham are set to scrap it out again for promotion to the Football League. It’s play-off season.

The odds are stacked against Wrexham as they head into the Conference play offs for a third successive season. If the Dragons are to avoid a dreaded sixth season away from the Football League they will need to overcome both an in form Kidderminster Harriers, and their own shortcomings.

Some might attribute Wrexham’s nosedive in league form to the distractions of Wembley and the FA Trophy run that so gripped the town, but the side’s struggles pre-date that lucrative trip south. In fact to blame a cup run would be trivial.

The entire narrative is riding against Wrexham as they head into a two legged showdown with a Kidderminster Harriers side riding on the crest of a wave, despite narrowly missing out on the Conference title.

Opponents Kidderminster lost their first five league games of the season back in August 2012 and had to wait until their eleventh fixture before recording a victory – almost a quarter of their season.

To put that achievement into context, they amassed 88 points from 35; Manchester United, newly crowned Premier League champions, have 84 from 34.

Wrexham player-manager Andy Morrell often fell on a consistent theme during his press conferences throughout the season – the idea that if another team embarked on an astonishing run of results, like Mansfield and Kidderminster did, he and his side would have to hold their hands up.

Perhaps it’s a logic that says ‘fair enough’, but it often smacked of defeatism. Morrell knew his squad was not capable of doing so. They were never capable of putting an impressive run of form, or set of results together. Four consecutive victories was the most put together, twice. Though the side did go on runs of 12 and 13 games without defeat, victories were regularly interspersed with draws. He preached a squad game, and yet results suffered because of a criminal lack of rotation.

As a result he has been forced to juggle on limited resources since the beginning of March; it is no coincidence that by this time Wrexham appeared leggy. The dogged away victories from the beginning of the turn of the year – at Alfreton, Gateshead, Hereford, Barrow and Lincoln – gave way to demoralising defeats at Dartford, Hyde and Woking.

Since March Wrexham’s form has plummeted, by contrast Kidderminster’s has soared. The Dragons have taken 16 points from a possible 39 and Harriers 31 from a possible 36. Wrexham scored just 13 goals in those 13 games, Kidderminster 30 in a fixture fewer.

Wrexham held a three point lead at the top of the Blue Square Bet Conference on March 5th. Six weeks and twelve games later they finished 15 points behind champions Mansfield, 13 behind opponents Kidderminster and 5th in the table.

Of course there is the caveat that Wrexham have been forced to field sub-strength teams – which is partly a consequence of the quirks of the fixture calendar, largely weather induced – but overwhelmingly it is due to a rigid team selection that sacrificed rotation at the hope of clinging onto narrow victories.

One can sympathise with Wrexham’s substantial injury list, but not before considering the sheer number of games many of the victims have clocked up over the past nine months. 54 games; half of them on a pitch which is little short of a disgrace. In a sense the FA Trophy is partly to blame for providing seven of the extra nine games on top of the league season, but to expect a small core of players to shoulder this burden was little short of irresponsible.

Wrexham approach the play offs ravaged by injuries across the board – in goal, in defence, in midfield and attack. Two of the most influential members of the squads are concerns; Neil Ashton continues to struggle with an ankle injury sustained in March, whilst Dean Keates has been absent since defeat at Woking earlier in the month.

The centre-back pairing of Martin Riley and Chris Westwood are certainly missing, with Mark Creighton’s comeback, he made his first appearance at Mansfield on Saturday since August, suddenly elevated to the utmost importance following Dave Artell’s unfathomable red card in the same game.

Kevin Thornton, nothing short of a revelation since his integration into the side from February, is injured and so too leading scorer Danny Wright, whose dislocated elbow suffered last week against Braintree seemed to define Morrell’s woes.

Though Leon Clowes, Jay Colbeck, Bradley Reid and Robbie Evans have made encouraging progress in the past few weeks, that Morrell did not trust in their ability, aptitude and application earlier in the campaign has cost Wrexham dearly.

Instead of building form and momentum towards the play offs, Wrexham whimpered; with the youngsters left to pick up the pieces as the team fell away, they limped to a 5th place finish which severely compromises their prospects of promotion.

It is not quite an unmitigated disaster, but undoubtedly they would have preferred to face an inconsistent Newport County than a formidable Kidderminster, one of the form teams across the breadth of the European leagues.

Wrexham and Morrell have nothing to lose. That is probably the way the Dragons’ player-manager would prefer to enjoy it, but there are serious issues that require addressing in this team, and a summer of rebuilding awaits whatever the outcome of these play offs matches.

Tickets are still avalible for tonights game, so get yourself along to the Racecourse for what promises to be a great night!