Birmingham City are trying to be like Wrexham. Or at least that’s according to some reviews of the umpteenth fly-on-the-wall football documentary, Built in Birmingham: Brady & the Blues.
The comparisons are inevitable. Here are two American-run clubs who have just been promoted to the Championship harbouring much-broadcasted ambitions of not only reaching the Premier League but staying there.
And both are now closer to realising this goal than they have been for years, with Wrexham preparing for a first season in the second tier since 1981-82, and Blues a far cry from their previous Championship guise that was largely staving off relegation.
After seven seasons of finishing between 17th and 20th, dropping down to League One was an inevitability, but it also sparked perhaps one of the most significant resets any EFL club has witnessed in recent times, with new owners Knighthead undeterred by the backwards’ step and spending more than Manchester City in the summer of 2024.
The response was expected, albeit emphatic: an EFL-record 111 points securing an immediate return to the Championship in a season where they finished above Wrexham and the Amazon Prime cameras rolled.
The timing of this documentary’s release is therefore no coincidence – the Championship starts at St Andrew’s on Friday night – and serves as proof of Blues’ admiration for Wrexham in action.
“I think it’s to be admired and certainly, to a degree, emulated,” Blues co-owner Tom Wagner said of the “storytelling genius” behind Wrexham’s commercial success in an interview with The i Paper in May.
The reception though has not been flattering. The second half of the name alone, Brady & the Blues, already hints at the documentary’s main protagonist, with NFL superstar turned minority Blues owner Tom Brady widely panned for how he comes across.
Arrogant, obnoxious and self-centred are words frequently seen in replies to Birmingham’s own X post promoting the show, a stark contrast to Welcome to Wrexham, praised for transcending the sport by shining the spotlight on the Welsh town and its colourful characters instead of following co-owners Rob McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds.
Football, meet @TomBrady.
— Birmingham City FC (@BCFC) August 1, 2025
All five episodes of Built In Birmingham: Brady & The Blues are now live on Prime Video.pic.twitter.com/0hcLzM0rXu
It appears to be a production faux pas, but who exactly Blues are trying to be off the pitch is immaterial provided they achieve their goals on it.
It is also worth remembering poster-boy Brady is not the driving force behind this club, his share is said to be 3.3 per cent, while this documentary is aimed at people an ocean away, not the ones who will be flooding St Andrew’s on Friday night for the Championship’s curtain-raiser.
There, Blues will look to lay down an early marker, facing an Ipswich Town side who have been installed as pre-season favourites to win the title.
Wrexham, meanwhile, face Southampton on Saturday, the second intriguing (and some may say convenient) match-up that pits a newly-promoted side with lofty dreams against a relegated club boosted by parachute payments.
Straight away then Birmingham and Wrexham face their biggest battle, for they are now competing against clubs with a helping hand.
Add to that player sales, Ipswich sold Liam Delap to Chelsea for £30m while Southampton appear to be seeking more for Everton target Tyler Dibling, and it is clear to see why the Saints are close behind Ipswich with the bookies.
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In at third? Birmingham, who under Wagner have made a point of closing the gap on the parachute-payment clubs before they were even in the same division.
“Parachute payment clubs have a roughly one-in-four chance of getting promoted,” Birmingham owner Tom Wagner told The Times in April.
“Non-parachute clubs have a one-in-16 chance. If we can achieve parachute-level revenues, we’re four times more likely to get promoted.”
Hence the documentary. Hence the plans for a new stadium on a new site that is inspired by Manchester City’s Etihad Campus, now a factory for so much talent the club are letting world-class players leave.
That is where Wagner and Birmingham want to be, and though they have reined in the spending this summer compared to last – arguably down to differing FFP rules between League One and Championship – this could become the year where we witness the scope of their potential far outweighing Wrexham’s.
So while Birmingham may be trying to copy the commercial Wrexham playbook, eventually it may be a case of the blueprint for success being sought the other way around.
If anyone is doing back-to-back (albeit in Wrexham’s case it would need two more backs), it is going to be Brady and the Blues.
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