Ryan & Rob give firm support to City of Culture bid and City Status “sounds like something you’d obviously want to support”

Wrexham AFC’s new owners have voiced their enthusiasm over two civic bids.

The comments came at a packed international press conference held at the Racecourse yesterday.

Every four years, a town or city is given the title of UK City of Culture – helping to raise its profile, hopefully boost its local economy and highlight everything that’s good about the location. Wrexham is amongst eight areas to have been longlisted for the UK City of Culture 2025 – and the only one in Wales.

In a dual effort, a bid is also being explored for City Status to ‘elevate’ us from being a town.

With the city bid being a hot topic locally we enquired if the club’s new owners supported the idea of a bid, and also pointed out the Queen has the final say, and if they had any words to her to get a possible bid over the line.

Rob said, “The first that we heard about it was actually this morning, and speaking with some of the Ministers, we haven’t had a chance to actually look into it quite yet. But, it sounded to us like something you’d obviously want to support. We have to talk about it and go from there.”

Laughing, Ryan noted he would not be baited into a comment on the Queen, with Rob taking a similar line “As far as the Queen goes, No comments.”

Another outlet asked about Wrexham being the only place in Wales going for City of Culture 2025 and if they supported that effort.

Together they said in sync, “Yes” adding, “Funnily enough we were only just talking about that today – definitely.”

With lots of questions asking football or less local angles, we thought we would enquire about some developments that have been long promised over the decades.

We asked the pair about the plans for the derelict Kop, and if there had been any progress in the redevelopment plans.

Rob kept tight lipped, “Yes. So we have very specific plans for that, which I don’t know that I’m even supposed to discuss right now.”

“We have been speaking, with officials, and we’re definitely furthering those those talks.”

Top pic: Rob, Ryan and Strategic Advisor to the Board Shaun Harvey – with the Kop in the background.