Wrexham are touring Australia and New Zealand for the very first time. While the Championship awaits the Welsh side in 2025-26, they will first have to play three A-League clubs across three cities on their preseason tour.
ESPN will be with them every step of the way as Phil Parkinson, Ryan Reynolds, Rob McElhenney & Co. plot their path to the Premier League.
Wrexham fighting fit upon Melbourne arrival
MELBOURNE -- "It's really far away, Australia, isn't it?" James McClean laughed, with the Yarra River stretching out behind him as he faced an early-morning media call.
"The furthest I've been prior has been Hong Kong. But this is a whole new level. Pretty far away."
He's not wrong.
Boarding a flight from Manchester on Sunday morning, the Red Dragons squad that will spend the next fortnight touring Australia and New Zealand landed on Monday evening local time, nearly 24 hours of flying and many time zones later.
Arduous as the trek is, though, the work that coach Phil Parkinson said the medical team had put into ensuring his side's sleep and all the other details that come with travelling appeared to have worked; McClean was full of beans on Tuesday morning. Or perhaps the Republic of Ireland international has simply found the cure for jet lag? He revealed he'd gone out on a successful hunt for a boxing gym in Melbourne after waking up that morning "full of energy."
Any sport, not just football, is a passion for McClean. It was the Australian sporting scene, rather than any of the local fauna, that he raised when asked what he was looking forward to experiencing during his time Down Under.
Quizzed on the style of Aussie play by a local journalist, the 36-year-old said he'd watched last season's A-League Grand Final between Melbourne Victory and Melbourne City a few months back -- remarking that Mathew Leckie, who put in a man-of-the-match performance in City's win despite having his face rearranged early in the second-half, had been "in the wars," in the "rough and ready" contest.
McClean won't have to choose between sport and nature on this trip as, this being a tour of Australia, there will be a zoo visit for the requisite happy snaps of players with kangaroos and koalas at some point. And they might not even need to wait that long to see the former, given that wild ones have been known to bound across the pitches in Bundoora, where they'll be training during their time in Melbourne.
But while McLean and Parkinson had their ambassadorial hats on for the large group of local media that greeted them on their first full day in Melbourne -- far bigger than the one or two journalists that usually attend such an event in a city where football is way down the pecking order -- they insist that this trip is no holiday. Less than 24 hours after touching down, the 30-player squad trained on Tuesday afternoon, and they'll be back out on the pitch early on Wednesday morning. With temperatures forecast to in the 40s Fahrenheit, or single figures in centigrade, they'll do so in conditions that will probably make them feel right at home.
Sights and sounds
Up The Town, Down Under 👊
— Wrexham AFC (@Wrexham_AFC) July 7, 2025
🔴⚪️ #WxmAFC pic.twitter.com/TMHBuKuJMi
Quote of the day
"We got here last night, we had a walk last evening, had a couple of beers in one of the bars -- just the staff, mind, not the players! That was good. I think that's important to get a feel for the city. We're really looking forward to getting out and about in our time here." -- Phil Parkinson.
What's on tomorrow for Wrexham?
Wrexham will hit the training track in Bundoora as they prepare for Friday evening's clash with Melbourne Victory, having to make do with one of the auxiliary pitches at the Home of the Matildas after Football Australia booked the main ones for the Emerging Socceroos Championships.