Liverpool needed a substitute to break down Wrexham. Rio Ngumoha, on for the final stretch, turned in a deflected strike in the 75th minute that proved to be the only goal of the night, sending Liverpool past Wrexham 1-0 in a preseason friendly at Yankee Stadium on Wednesday. It wasn’t pretty, and for long spells it wasn’t even clearly Liverpool’s game — but it was enough.
More than 42,000 fans packed the Bronx ballpark-turned-football pitch for a fixture that meant very different things to the two clubs involved. For Liverpool, it was another rep in a preseason still finding its shape under new manager Andoni Iraola. For Wrexham, it was the biggest night yet in a rise that still sounds made up: from England’s fifth tier to sharing a field with a Premier League giant, in front of a sellout American crowd, four years after Hollywood came calling.
How Ngumoha Found the Winner
The breakthrough came from the bench. Ngumoha had been on the field only a matter of minutes when his effort took a deflection and looped beyond Wrexham goalkeeper Danny Ward, who got a hand to it but couldn’t keep it out. It was the kind of goal that looks better on the scoresheet than it did in real time — scrappy, slightly fortunate, and exactly the sort Liverpool will happily bank in late July.
The numbers tell a more complicated story than the scoreline. Liverpool controlled the ball for most of the night, finishing with 61% possession and an 89% pass-completion rate to Wrexham’s 81%. But shot quality told a different tale: Wrexham actually created the better chances, with four “big chances” carved out to Liverpool’s one. Wrexham had 11 shots to Liverpool’s 19, and both sides managed just three or four on target apiece. In short, Liverpool dominated territory; Wrexham dominated the moments that actually mattered — they simply didn’t finish them.
A Patchwork Liverpool Backline
Iraola had little choice but to experiment. Joe Gomez was already sidelined after picking up an injury in Liverpool’s prior friendly against Sunderland, Virgil van Dijk stayed behind in England for individual fitness work rather than travel, and both Ibrahima Konaté and Giovanni Leoni were unavailable. That left two academy prospects, Mor Talla Ndiaye and Ifeanyi Ndukwe, to start in central defense against a Wrexham side that had already beaten Manchester United and Leeds on this same US trip.
There were signs of life going forward, at least. Florian Wirtz, Alexander Isak, and Ryan Gravenberch were all back involved after being managed earlier in the tour, and Federico Chiesa pushed for more minutes after scoring against Sunderland. Iraola framed the result as incremental progress rather than a finished product: “were more solid” than the Sunderland game, he said, adding, “Slowly, slowly I hope every game we are closer and closer.”
Wrexham’s Unbeaten Summer Keeps the Story Going
If Liverpool treated this as preseason maintenance, Wrexham treated it as the moment their extraordinary decade arrived at Yankee Stadium. Owned since 2021 by actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, the club has climbed from the National League — the fifth tier of English football — into the EFL Championship, a rise chronicled (and fueled by) the “Welcome to Wrexham” documentary series. This US swing, the club’s third since 2023, had already produced wins over Manchester United and Leeds before the Liverpool test, and Wrexham arrived at the Bronx ballpark still unbeaten in preseason.
Reynolds, never short of a line, called the prospect of facing Liverpool at Yankee Stadium a “punch-me moment” — a nod to just how unlikely this fixture would have sounded before the takeover. Losing 1-0 to one of Europe’s biggest clubs, on the road, while missing the run of form that got them here, is not the outcome Wrexham wanted. But it’s also the kind of result nobody connected to the club would have believed possible five years ago, and the unbeaten preseason run against Premier League and Championship opposition says as much about where Wrexham is now as the final score does.
What’s Next
Liverpool’s US tour continues with a stop in Philadelphia against Sunderland to close things out, the last tune-up before the Premier League season resumes. Wrexham, meanwhile, heads back across the Atlantic to prepare for its own Championship campaign, carrying momentum from a preseason that included scalps against two established English clubs even as this particular night ended in a loss.
Neither result will be remembered long once competitive matches begin. But for one night in the Bronx, two very different club stories — a giant working through a rebuilt back line, and a fifth-tier club turned sellout attraction — shared the same pitch.
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