Los Angeles is a hotspot for international football’s biggest clubs during pre-season.
At least nine Premier League outfits, including the current top four teams, are coming to America this summer to kickstart their pre-season preparations, as has become customary for many clubs over the past decade as the league and sport continues to grow in popularity stateside. They will be joined by some of Europe’s biggest names, including Serie A giants Juventus and UEFA Champions League semi-finalists A.C. Milan, who have games scheduled at LA Galaxy’s Dignity Health Sports Park and SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, among other U.S. locations. Perhaps the most exciting for American soccer fans is the clash between Real Madrid and Barcelona, another Stateside pre-season El Clasico, at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
Naturally, tickets to these events come at a steep price. The prices for El Clasico range from $200-$800, for example.
If the quality of talent on offer is the arbiter for price, tickets to watch Wrexham play LA Galaxy’s reserves on July 22 should barely reach a tenth of the cost of El Clasico. In actuality, however, they are priced in a relatively similar bracket.
The cheapest standing room ticket to watch Wrexham – who have recently won promotion to League Two, English football’s fourth tier – play against LA Galaxy II, who play in the third tier of U.S. soccer’s pyramid, is priced at $55. For that, two people could get tickets to watch the LA Dodgers and have money left over to buy a drink. Or they could pick up a couple of seats to watch Galaxy’s first-team play in MLS and have a seat for the game’s duration. For that luxury at Galaxy II vs. Wrexham it will cost north of $100 per ticket. The most expensive tickets come in at $500, a ridiculous price considering the quality of football on show. So, how are they able to charge this much?
Consider this: Growing up in the United Kingdom, I dreamed of watching an NBA game live. From around 14 years old to the most recent event in 2019, my friends and I would wait on the portal as they released tickets to the NBA London event, the one game a year that we could feasibly attend together. Tickets were slightly overpriced compared to the average NBA home game ($60-$1,300), but that was to be expected. It was a spectacle at The O2 in London that happened once a year — a chance to see the players we followed from afar and spot celebrities sitting courtside.
Regardless of who was playing – whether we were watching the worst team in the league or the reigning champions, and it was more often also-ran or lottery teams – the chance to be there for the spectacle of an NBA game was worth the price. Inevitably we would fail to snag tickets as they would sell out immediately, but for the chance to see something you would maybe not have the opportunity to see again, it felt worthwhile.
Of course, Wrexham’s squad is not world-level. Ben Foster, former England and Premier League goalkeeper, is the only player available to manager Phil Parkinson that has played top-flight football consistently at any point of their career, and he turned 40 in April. While the debate continues regarding whether Paul Mullin is good enough to start in MLS, the quality is not comparable to the worst NBA franchise. But they have star quality – arguably a more sellable asset than technical quality, particularly in a market like Los Angeles.
Wrexham to play LA Galaxy II during US TOUR!
🔴⚪ #WxmAFC
— Wrexham AFC (@Wrexham_AFC) May 1, 2023
According to Mullin, Wrexham’s top goalscorer and standout player in FX’s Welcome to Wrexham TV series, club owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney think he is more famous in the States than the majority of international football players, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi aside.
Wrexham is the fastest-growing club in America, transcending the sport itself. They are an emerging media phenomenon that appeals to a broad audience of long-time football fans and those more invested in the show’s people and community-first outlook. For many, attending a game between Wrexham and Galaxy II is less about two teams contesting an exhibition match and more about having a first-hand experience with a story to which they’ve formed an emotional attachment.
“What’s special about what Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney has done is how they’ve leaned in with their celebrity to the club,” Galaxy president Chris Klein told The Athletic. “It’s more than just a football story. You know, the town’s story and the club’s history. The division of football they’re playing in and how difficult it is to get promoted have all come together to make it interesting to watch and follow. I think all those have been a piece of why it’s captivated so many people.
“We’re expecting a big crowd. People will want to come to watch as people are engaged in the story and engaged by the club. Look, you see that their game in North Carolina sold out, and the game in San Diego sold out. In those games, you also have Manchester United and Chelsea, but I certainly think here in LA that people are gonna want to come and see this.”
Tickets to watch Wrexham play Premier League opposition are significantly more expensive. The cheapest available on Ticketmaster for when they face Manchester United at San Diego’s Snapdragon Stadium began at $125, four dollars more expensive than the lowest price for the Chelsea game in Chapel Hill, NCl. As of this writing, the cheapest tickets currently available for the San Diego match are $200 and the cheapest available for the Chapel Hill match are $148. Of course, Wrexham’s Premier League opponents in those matches are influencing the ticket prices, but according to United’s football director John Murtough, the team selected by head coach Erik Ten Hag will likely be heavily youth-oriented.
While the prices appear exorbitant at first, they are, given the location and popularity of Wrexham, about par for the course. The standard will not match the Premier League, nor MLS, for that matter, but the quality of football is not why Wrexham are famous. Had any other National League or EFL club proposed to face a Galaxy team at Dignity Health Sports Park, the club’s business executives would not have given them the time of day. But Wrexham’s players are now television stars, their owners are movie stars, and the club is one of Hollywood’s freshest stories.
Wrexham have plans on maintaining their relevance far beyond next season, but this match between them and Galaxy II, in particular, will provide an interesting referendum on just how far they’ve come to this point. If the stadium is a sell-out, it’ll prove the pricing was shrewd and Wrexham’s popularity far exceeds its footballing quality. If they struggle to fill Dignity Health Sports Park, then it suggests this leg of the American tour, where they’re not facing a giant of English football, was overestimated.
“We’ve decided to come over to the U.S. on the basis that, in mind of the newfound status of the club, playing in the U.S. was an obvious thing for us to do. Like everything, to be successful, you continue to do what is bringing success,” says Shaun Harvey, advisor to Wrexham’s board. “There’s no doubt that the biggest growth market for Wrexham in the world is the USA, and what better chance of getting more people the opportunity to watch the team that they’ve now adopted first-hand than actually playing in the country itself?”
The price point is steep, but is it too much to experience something that would otherwise cost thousands of dollars on a transatlantic flight, accommodations and tickets to watch the event itself in Wrexham’s homeland? Wrexham’s American fans will decide. But teenage me would have spent significantly more on a basketball ticket at The O2, regardless of who was playing.
(Photo by Matthew Ashton – AMA/Getty Images)
