Their plan looks like a cross between Manchester City and Wrexham.

But Dagenham and Redbridge’s US-based multi-club ownership group say the quest to climb up the pyramid will be done with a whole lot of East End grit. The Daggers visit Millwall tonight looking to knock out another League team after beating Wimbledon in the second round and Crewe in their opening tie.

And chairman Daniel Hall, from Kent but now based in Los Angeles, has made it clear the medium-term goal is to reach League One – just like Wrexham. Hall’s Club Underdog are just the latest group to buy several teams with ambitions to develop a network that shares mutual benefits.

At a base level it seems rather familiar, another organisation influenced by the City Group. Except, Hall emphasises, their “unique selling point” is in the group’s title. “The name describes what we do,” he says.

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In other words they are interested in distressed and under-performing teams at a low ebb but with huge upside.

“We’re doing our own thing,” Hall continues. “Rob and Ryan have done a fantastic job at Wrexham and they are similar to Dagenham after a decade in non-League.

“But if you look at our Italian team, Campobasso, their trajectory matches Wrexham’s. They’ve gone from the fifth tier to Serie C. So we've our own history of taking under-privileged teams and moving them up.”

Going forward, he says of a collective that also includes clubs in New York and Switzerland, “we’ll look to integrate the clubs from a financial point of view and a player pathway.”

He is not oblivious to the challenges, either.

Dagenham are 16th on a table of London clubs. It is a congested market and the local area is packed with fans, and their training ground is a mile and a half up the road. But Hall’s definition of success is to be a source of pride for one of the capital’s most deprived areas.

“What struck me when we looked at buying the team is they are heavily involved in the community,” he says. "If you look at the borough, it’s one of the poorest in London but we want to help raise it up and make it a better place to live. That involves success on the field.”

Club Underdog took over at Victoria Road last May from another American group of investors that featured former goalkeeper Tim Howard.

Their predecessors also had grand visions to build up a side that spent nine seasons in the EFL, including a solitary campaign in the third tier, before dropping into non-League in 2016.

But Howard and company were unable to crack the National League and Hall quickly realised that “it’s a very hard league to get out of.” He is convinced the quality of League Two is not much better, adding: “Look at the teams that get promoted, they sometimes go straight up to League One.”

The season so far has been inconsistent. Manager Ben Strevens was sacked on Day and they are seven points off a play-off spot, nine points clear of relegation.

But Hall insists the third tier is not too lofty a goal. “It’s probably not going to happen in the next two years,” he adds. “But in the next 10 years that’s something we believe can happen.”

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