Here’s how to follow along with our coverage – the finest writing and up-to-the-minute reports
Our essential Saturday morning gateway to the weekend’s football returns and Yara El-Shaboury is your host as the Championship launches with a flurry of matches. Readers are invited to get in touch with their plans for the day; we spin through the headlines from overnight, including Friday night’s Birmingham v Ipswich curtain-raiser; and we flag the day’s big Championship, Football League and Scottish Premiership matches, with team news and all the latest breaking transfer stories. Post your thoughts and questions to Ben Fisher for our Football League Q&A at 11am. Send your queries to matchday.live@theguardian.com from 9.30am. Ben sets the scene on the new Championship season – the contenders, hopefuls and youngsters to watch – here.
Wrexham return to the second tier for the first time in 43 years. Three consecutive promotions have taken the Red Dragons – the Welsh club with Hollywood backing and an unlikely global following – from the National League to an opening-day fixture at Southampton, freshly relegated from the Premier League. While some fans have been dreaming that Wrexham can make it four promotions in succession there is the danger that, after such a rapid rise, they find their ceiling – the jump from League One to the Championship is bigger than those they have bridged in the past couple of years. Ben Fisher reports from St Mary’s.
