Apple TV+ sitcomTed Lassohas brought joy to viewers around the world since it debuted in 2020, thanks to the relentlessly sunny disposition of its eponymous football coach, and the hilarity ensuing from its clash of Anglo-American sporting cultures. The show’s focus on soccer – or football, as it’s known in Britain, Europe, and most of the world – has proven a hit with both die-hard fans and complete newcomers to the beautiful game. However, as is inevitable with a series created by Americans primarily for Americans,Ted Lasso’s depiction of soccer isn’t quite what those across the pond would expect.
It’s fundamentally a fish-out-of-water comedy about interpersonal relationships, with its sporting setting simply providing context for the humor derived from Ted’s attempts to adapt to an environment that’s completely alien to him. FromTed Lasso’s first episode to its newly-confirmed season 4, the show has always been happy to poke fun at its own Americanness, through endless jokes about the different ways people have of doing and saying things on either side of the Atlantic. There’s also plenty about soccer that it gets spot on. Still,football experts would highlight certain key aspects of the game that the series gets wrong.
1AFC Richmond’s On-Field Formation
Whether Gridiron Or Total Football, It Just Doesn’t Make Sense
Ted Lassoportrays the real dynamics of an English Premier Leaguefootball match relatively convincingly. Besides the fact that Lasso’s team AFC Richmond and their opponents often appear to be running through quicksand, while the show’s goalkeepers look as though they couldn’t catch a cold, the gameplay is otherwise quite realistic. That is, except for Lasso’s choice of formation when setting up his team.
There are countless gags made in the show’s first season about Ted’s lack of tactical knowledge. So when AFC Richmond score from a set-piece straight of the NFL playbook during a game against Manchester City in the final episode ofTed Lassoseason 1, it’s not only one of the show’s best laughs, but a redemptive vindication of their manager’s unorthodox approach as a tactician.
Yet in footballing terms,this goal makes absolutely no sense. For one thing, if Richmond did line up in gridiron formation on the halfway line, their opponents, already 1-0 up in the game, could simply sit back and defend deep, allowing Lasso’s team to pass the ball around midfield without threatening their goal. For another, Richmond are simply wasting precious seconds lining up in this formation, as the clock ticks down with the ball dead.
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In season 3, after Richmond lose to Dutch club Ajax in a midseason friendly (which, in itself, is a highly unrealistic plot point to occur during a competitive league season), Lasso switches up his team’s formation again. Now,he’s looking to implement the Total Football approach of Ajax’s legendary European Cup-winning team, featuring Johann Cruyff. This approach is effectively an excuse forTed Lassoto throw any semblance of real football tactics out of the window, with all of AFC Richmond’s players now playing without a fixed position on the pitch.
Total Football was a revolution in soccer during the 1970s, which influenced various coaches in the modern game, from AC Milan’s Arrigo Sacchi to FC Barcelona and Manchester City’s Pep Guardiola. Butit’d be impossible to implement this style of football nowadays, as the game’s tactics and physicality have advanced dramatically since the heyday of Cruyff’s Ajax team. While Guardiola has adapted elements of Total Football to the way his teams play, his formation and tactics are very different overall. If Ted Lasso tried to have his team play Total Football in the actual Premier League, they’d lose every game.
2The Dressing Room Is Not Called The Locker Room
That Expression Should Never Come Out Of A British Mouth
During the course ofTed Lasso’s three seasons, generally excels at playing around with how British sporting terminology differs from its American equivalents. Ted’s insistence on using the word “practice” rather than “training” to refer to his team’s preparations for their upcoming game is a continual source of amusement for his players. Despite the fact that he’s corrected multiple times by other members of staff at AFC Richmond, the coach just can’t seem to get the hang of the British term.
It’s downright unforgivable for British football fans when homegrown players for a London-based club use American sporting terms in the show.
On the other hand, it’s downright unforgivable for British football fans when homegrown players for the London-based club use American sporting terms in the show. The term “locker room” is the foremost offender, since this is an expression that would never come out of a British footballer’s mouth.In Britain, a sports locker room is called a “dressing room”, particularly in a football context. Hearing British actors playing British characters say “locker room” is jarring to the ears of a football fan in the UK, and shatters any suspension of disbelief thatTed Lassohas earned elsewhere.
3It’s A Draw, Not A Tie
A Tie Is A Type Of Match In A Knockout Competition
Similarly, hearing British football commentators refer to a football game in which both teams have scored the same number of goals as a“tie” rather than a “draw” further underminesTed Lasso’s footballing credentials. While the word “tie” may be used in this sense in the context of other British sports, there’s an important reason why it doesn’t work for football matches.
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In British football, a “tie” is a fixture between two teams who’ve been chosen to play each other in a knockout competition. It’s often used as part of the expression “cup tie”. For example, AFC Richmond faced Tottenham in a cup tie inseason 2 ofTed Lasso, in the quarter-finals of the FA Cup. In this context, also using the word “tie” to refer to a game in which scores are level can sow confusion among those listening to football commentary.
4Ted Training AFC Richmond In Front Of Their Fans
He’s Giving Away His Tactics To The Opposition
As with virtually every football club in Britain with professional status,Ted Lasso’s football team AFC Richmondhas its own training ground, where players spend most of their time preparing for an upcoming game. Aside from a designated media area, no one should be allowed inside the training complex except club employees, ensuring that the tactics the team is working on are kept a closely-guarded secret prior to the next game. YetTed Lassodoesn’t seem to have heard of this custom.
The 3,000-seater SkyEX Community Stadium in Hayes, Greater London, the home ground of Hayes & Yeading United FC, is used as the set for AFC Richmond’s training ground inTed Lasso.
The show stations AFC Richmond’s training facilities at an actual football stadium, which welcomes members of the public to come and watch Ted’s sessions with his team. Any opposition team’s scout could simply walk into the ground and make a full report of the tactics Richmond are planning for their next encounter. Even in parts of the world where public training sessions are a more common occurrence, such as Spain, these sessions are typically scripted affairs for the cameras, while the real training goes on behind closed doors.
5The Lack Of Transfers Out Of AFC Richmond
Any Relegated Club Necessarily Loses At Least Some Of Its Players
At the end ofTed Lasso’s first season,AFC Richmond are relegated from the Premier League following their final-day loss to Manchester City. They’re demoted to the second tier of English football, the Championship, and face a struggle to return to the big-time. In real-life football, this event is usually accompanied by a mass exodus of players via transfers to other clubs, as more talented members of a relegated team’s squad are able to secure moves to other teams who’ve managed to stay in the Premier League.
These transfers are essential, both for the financial survival of the demoted club, since the Championship is far less financially lucrative than the Premier League, and for the careers of players who want to make it to the top of their sport. Butwhen AFC Richmond are relegated inTed Lasso, Ted somehow manages to keep his entire squadof players together.
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Nobody wants to leave the club, despite it dropping down to a lower division, and the ownership doesn’t push for transfers to raise the money Richmond surely needs to stay solvent while competing at a lower level. In fact, they even manage to sign the best player from their previous season,Manchester City loanee andTed Lasso’s most talented footballer Jamie Tartt, who’s really too good for the Championship, on a permanent contract.
6Where’s All The Rain & Mud?
This Is British Football, After All
One particularly unrealistic aspect ofTed Lassoin visual terms is just how pristine its football players look during and after their games. Unlike in the US, soccer in Britain is a winter sport played between late August and May, when grey skies will be tipping it down with rain more often than not. Yet, we don’treally seeTed Lasso’s characters having to play footballin this type of weather in the show. What’s more, once each game is over, the players return to the dressing room looking like they’ve barely broken a sweat, let alone been involved in a contact sport played on muddy grass.
AFC Richmond’s players should be deemed to be letting their fans down if they didn’t come back into the dressing room dripping with mud, sweat and tears.
The quality of professional football playing surfaces in Britain has improved no-end compared with decades gone by, when it wasn’t uncommon to play on a pitch that was more mud than grass. Still, as any Premier League player will attest to, unless Britain is going through an especially dry spell near the start or the end of a season,those involved in a football game are going to return to the dressing room covered in mud.
The footballers inTed Lasso, on the other hand, are clean as a whistle at the end of each match. Not only is this feature of the show unrealistic, but Richmond’s players should be deemed to be letting their fans down if they didn’t come back into the dressing room dripping with mud, sweat and tears. Football might be called the beautiful game, but it’s not supposed to be pretty.
