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Strap in for Welsh football's most fascinating season in 30 years - and Wales dare not fail You have to go back three decades for last time Bluebirds, Dragons and Swans clashed in the same league - and stakes are also sky high for Bellamy as Euros home soil bid begins Sony launched their PlayStation (how popular that turned out to be!), the Queen opened the Channel Tunnel to link England with France and Nelson Mandela became South Africa’s first black president. Pulp Fiction and Forrest Gump were among Hollywood’s highest-grossing films and a couple of guys by the name of Gallagher, aka Oasis, hit the music charts for the first time. In other 1994-95 news, Welsh trio Cardiff City, Wrexham and Swansea City played against one another in the same division. Yes, you have to go back more than three decades for the last time that happened. It really is a rare feat. Which is why, when you throw Craig Bellamy's Wales Euros home soil hopefuls into the mix too, there is an argument for saying Welsh football 2026-27 is among the most exciting, intriguing and eagerly anticipated seasons in a generation. OK, we had Cardiff and Swansea in the Premier League in 2013-14, but Wrexham were non-league, Newport County had spent 25 years at that level - and Wales couldn’t buy a win under Chris Coleman at the time. It is hardly quantifiable for what is in store for the Welsh game as a whole over the coming nine months. So much to play for. So many questions to be answered. Plenty to look forward to. For club and country. Back in the 1990s the Bluebirds, Robins and Swans were doing battle for Welsh bragging rights in the old Second Division, the third tier. Gates were substantially lower, the players weren’t as good, the profile nothing like it is today. Social media didn’t exist, mobile phones were a new phenomenon. Those footballing giants of Tranmere Rovers, Grimsby Town, Southend United, Oldham Athletic, Port Vale and Notts County were playing in a higher division. Crikey, Blackburn Rovers even won the Premier League. Looking back, it seems like the land before time! Fast forward to today and it will be Cardiff, Wrexham and Swansea gunning for the riches of the top flight via promotion from the Championship. Their mouthwatering ‘Welsh derby’ battles - six in total, plus you can throw in the Bristol City Severnside showdown for the Bluebirds to make it eight - will be watched by pretty much capacity crowds, with interest levels and fervour off the scale. I can’t recall too many seasons quite like this one. Just how it plays out is anyone’s guess at this stage, the uncertainty simply increasing the intrigue. How seamlessly will Cardiff’s gifted crop of youngsters cope with the step up in class? Did boss Brian Barry-Murphy need to strengthen more in the summer transfer window? Will his Bluebirds prove the surprise package of the Championship? We will discover some early answers when Cardiff kick off against Wrexham on Monday night, the eyes of a nation - and America - upon the Welsh game. The Red Dragons, the opposite of Cardiff’s youth as an experienced, battle-hardened outfit, have plenty of questions of their own. Was seventh place last term as good as it gets? Is Phil Parkinson the man to take the club to even greater heights? Is this the year when the Hollywood fairytale has a less happy ending? What about Swansea? Can they keep hold of Zan Vipotnik, last season’s second-tier top scorer with 23 goals? If so, how do they balance having three senior strikers on the books, with £6m ex-Celtic frontman Adam Idah and new capture Ross Stewart keen to start? Is the rest of the team good enough? How will Vitor Matos fare in his first full season in charge? So many posers everywhere you look, which makes crystal ball gazing pretty much an impossible call. Three decades ago there was a right mish-mash of results. Wrexham walloped Swansea 4-1, Cardiff battered Wrexham 3-0 up at The Racecourse and Swansea stunned Cardiff 4-1 at the old Vetch Field. Talk about topsy-turvy. Cardiff were in a mess, managed that year by Eddie May, Terry Yorath and then May again, with owner Rick Wright losing interest. The fact that his plan to take the Bluebirds out of the Football League and into the League of Wales went down like a lead balloon with Bluebirds fans didn’t help Wright’s mood. Quite rightly people power dissuaded Wright, otherwise a brilliant chairman of the club, from such a daft course of action. But Cardiff, with an ageing Mark Aizelwood, Wayne Fereday, Nathan Wigg and a striker by the name of Darren Adams amongst their mix, were relegated, even losing to Enfield in the FA Cup. Wrexham, under the stewardship of Brian Flynn, finished 13th and won what many consider to be the last truly meaningful Welsh Cup final, overcoming Cardiff in front of a sizeable crowd at the old Cardiff Arms Park. The FAW, in their wisdom, chose to kick their bigger clubs out of the competition the following year. Sadly, the Welsh Cup has never been the same again, losing sponsorship, revenue and the general appeal a great competition once had. Swansea were 10th, but manager Frank Burrows departed the moment the campaign was over, bringing to an end a productive four-year spell in charge in west Wales. His replacement, Bobby Smith, was no Burrows. Who finishes highest this time around is anyone’s guess. The three Welsh teams each have strengths and weaknesses, but with eighth place enough for the play-offs they will be hoping to be in the mix come the business end of the campaign. For Newport County the challenge is entirely different with new boss Hayden Mullins tasked with a drive back up the League Two table following last season’s narrow escape from relegation. Mullins has a much lower profile than Premier League title winner Christian Fuchs, but he will be banking upon brief spells in charge at Watford and Colchester, as well as success with Fulham under-21s, offering him enough expertise to take on the Rodney Parade challenge. That Mullins is a rookie boss is undeniable. But Newport chairman Huw Jenkins made some inspired appointments when going down this route as Swansea chief - Roberto Martinez, Brendan Rodgers and Paulo Sousa among his left-field choices - so everyone will be hoping this proves to be another excellent capture. Speaking of rookie managers, Craig Bellamy has two years behind him in the Wales dugout but it is fair to suggest the honeymoon period is over after a summer of turmoil when he appeared Burnley bound… then opted to stay not so much at the 11th hour, more at one millisecond to midnight. Bellamy, of course, can present this as loyalty to his country ahead of the opportunity to quadruple his salary. I’ve started this job, I need to see it through. That will play to a section of the fan base. Others require greater convincing following World Cup failure and question marks over Bellamy’s use of Liam Cullen and Mark Harris as substitutes when Bosnia play-off victory was snatched away. Against that backdrop, the manager needs to halt a run which sees Wales winless in four and with Nations League fixtures versus Portugal, Denmark and Erling Haaland’s Norway on the horizon. A tall order. Yet it was only five games back that Wales battered North Macedonia with a seven-star show that had Bellamy-Ball written over it. If such levels are unlikely to be attained again, nonetheless that will be the benchmark as Bellamy seeks to drive the team towards a Euro 2028 tournament being played on UK soil. The qualifying draw takes place in 16 weeks’ time. The games, played over a short, sharp eight-month period, begin in March. This unique situation provides an extra thrilling twist to the season upon us because it is simply inconceivable that Euro 2028 will kick off at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium without Wales being present. Many believe the best chance is for Bellamy to freshen up with some new players, ditching one or two he has been overly-loyal to. Any post-Burnley blues will be banished with a few critical wins, but the stakes are as high as they get here. Differences fans of Cardiff, Wrexham and Swansea have in the Championship will be put to one side as they gang together to roar on Team Wales. But once Bellamy’s men finish, the tribalism will return. It never goes away, to be honest. It will just be more in the spotlight in the coming months as Welsh football’s most beguiling season in decades kicks off. Well, when you’ve waited in excess of 30 years…