Football’s most moving story from Wrexham: Where kids with autism can find refuge – and it’s not just down to Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney’s investment, writes IAN HERBERT

Just when there seemed no room for anything but noise in the all-consuming world of football – no quiet, small space for those who would struggle with the sound and fury of the game – an introduction to Gate 12 at Wrexham’s ground, and what was behind it, told me differently last Friday. It was a profound experience.

The gate, and the seating area it leads to, is the vision of a woman I first encountered about a year ago, when I was writing a book about the transformation of Wrexham – both club and city – following the arrival of Rob McElhenney and Ryan. Reynolds.

I mentioned the book Tinseltown, although Kerry Evans’ work began long before Hollywood fell, at a time when the club could not afford to pay her a wage as the first disability liaison officer, nor could she travel funding for fans who, like her, are in wheelchairs. She raised the money herself.

Attending a football match and experiencing what it’s like to be a football fan is even more challenging for people on the autistic spectrum who need order, routine and their own space, and who can find anything unexpected a terrifying experience .

These are those for whom the 120-seat section founded by Evans has become a weekly retreat, making Wrexham’s Racecourse Ground one of the best places in Britain for people with autism and physical disabilities to watch football.

The stories their parents quietly told me there reminded us of what football can bring to the lives of people with challenges, if only the game lets them in.

In my fifteen years as a sports reporter, I cannot remember a more moving experience than hearing Helen Docking, a mother, describe the effect of being able to attend a football match on her 16-year-old son, Deian, who has withdrawn. , unable to form relationships, unable to communicate with others and on the edge of an educational system from which she has been forced to remove him.

“It’s taking a toll on all of us,” Helen says, not far from tears. ‘We have tried everything to get him back to school, but the games are the only time he leaves the house. We are not judged when we come here. We have not found this kind of support in the education system.’

They and other parents don’t need much to make football matches viable for their children: simply the same seat every match in this autism-friendly zone, the familiar faces of the same stewards – Amy and Nicky – and their keen understanding of what makes such children different.

At half-time the stewards bring refreshments to these young supporters in their seats, as entering the concourse can be an ordeal for them. Gate 12, a designated quiet entrance, is not affected by a turnstile. That helps too.

Another mother, Sue, is always here at 1pm with her own autistic son, because the experience of walking into the stadium is not traumatic when it is empty. She talks about how the football sessions Evans organizes for some of the group have given her son a different form of access to the game.

Some here will still find that the matchday noise becomes too much and a small sensory area in the stands, with multi-coloured lighting that can be soothing, often helps. An eight-year-old lies spread across two chairs and rests her head on her mother’s lap, with one of the stress-relieving “weighted blankets” the facility provides placed over her.

It is not only young people who seek refuge. Ann Burden’s deteriorating mental health led her to quit her job as a shop assistant and walk into the club to return the season ticket she had had since a girl. “They suggested I talk to Kerry,” she says. ‘The stand has given me a piece of my life back.’

McElhenney and Reynolds offered to invest in an expansion of the facility, with Evans being allocated a larger area of ​​station space for her zone. “Thanks, but we don’t need that,” she told them. “If the portion is too large, it loses the intimacy we need.”

She is the gatekeeper of her little territory, through whom all requests to use it and be part of it must go. She knows all the people sitting here as Wrexham kick off against Mansfield – Theo Smith, Noah Jones, Idris Parry-Tabeart and many more, with their myriad challenges and needs.

She is the center of the room all afternoon, taking only a brief break in her motorized chair at halftime to watch the people in the designated wheelchair area for visiting fans ahead of the away game, which McElhenney and Reynolds have. had built for her. Few clubs offer visitors with disabilities such a welcome.

“She is both our social worker and the organizer of it all,” said another mother, Becky Parry-Tabeart, who described at half-time how the place has become “a magical change” for Idris, who struggled for more than five years to cope. minutes in a general area of ​​the ground.

When Wrexham’s Paul Mullin scores for us to put Wrexham ahead, our section of the stand erupts, creating an environment that allows people here to feel what football fans feel and, in some cases, to express it.

After Wrexham win the match 2-0, Gate 12 is opened to allow those in our zone to leave. They will experience more challenges than most before they get here for Crawley’s visit next Tuesday evening, but these two or three hours have offered something indefinably special.

“Win or lose, he loves it,” says Helen, as she heads home with Deian. “I can see it in his face.”

Girls show perseverance to the boys

A 10-0 win for my grandson’s team in the last match before Easter, on a Saturday morning that made you worry about an opponent who had arrived without any substitutions.

Some of the boys’ heads went down when our eighth goal came, but not Lily and Chloe, who were playing up front.

Ten years ago, those girls would have had no female football role models to draw inspiration from and probably wouldn’t even have stood on that soggy pitch in south Manchester, quietly showing the boys what tolerance looks like.

Lyon’s borders cannot dampen the start of the County Championship

My Lancashire CCC membership card reached me a month ago and before a ball has even been bowled comes the news that Nathan Lyon will be restricted to seven County Championship matches by Cricket Australia.

It doesn’t detract from the sense of anticipation about what awaits us: the freshly laid outfield, the first ball of the new season, against Surrey, Friday at 11am, and that wonderful feeling of summer.