Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, stars of Deadpool and It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, respectively, have recently been found hiding away as Easter eggs in FIFA 23. This shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, as the duo are co-owners of the Welsh football club Wrexham AFC, a smaller, less prestigious club that has now been featured in the FIFA series for the second year in a row.
Reynolds and McElhenney became co-owners of Wrexham AFC in late 2020. The two comedy stars had never even met before, according to McElhenney, when Reynolds approached him with a case of his celebrity-branded gin asking if he wanted to co-own a team in a sport neither of them knew much about. They even have a documentary TV series airing on FX called We Are Wrexham chronicling their fish-out-of-water stint as the American co-chairmen of a European football club. Their short time as celebrity owners has already raised Wrexham AFC’s profile high enough to be included in one of the best-selling video game franchises of all time.
While playing as Wrexham AFC, the match commentators will throw the broadcast to Reynolds and McElhenney for their brief, funny thoughts on rival clubs. In one segment, Reynolds calls Liverpool a “minuscule, improvisational version of a football club.” Liverpool are annually ranked in the top 20 most valuable sports franchises in the world. So far, only two chunks of dialogue have been found in the hugely successful FIFA 23, but there could be more discovered as players around the world spend more time playing as the celebrity-owned franchise.
Wrexham AFC’s inclusion in FIFA 22 inspired Reynolds and McElhenney to release a video on Reynolds’ personal YouTube channel mocking EA’s inclusion of Wrexham in a league category called “Rest of World.” The fictional catchall league is made up of major teams from football leagues around the world that are not included in the game. In real life, Wrexham AFC plays in the National League, which is the fifth tier in the English football league system made up of a 20-tiered pyramid comprised of thousands of teams. This places Wrexham only four leagues away from the pinnacle of the system, the Premier League.
To include other North American comedians dabbling in European soccer, EA has added AFC Richmond to FIFA 23. They’re the fictional English football club from the Apple Plus comedy series Ted Lasso. The game includes AFC Richmond’s fictional stadium and facial scans of the club’s fictional footballers, like Mexican phenom Danny Rojas and league legend Roy Kent. Star Jason Sudeikis even lends his face and voice to the game as the show’s titular club manager.
FIFA 23 is available now on Nintendo Switch, PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
