EXCLUSIVE: MEET TED LASSO’S AFC.RICHMOND’S LADY GREYHOUNDS
From left to right back row: Kasali Casal (Director of Football) Annalise Heywood (Mady) Mercedes Assad (Margy) Abbie Hern (Gemma) Jude Mack (Boots) Shannon Hayes (Shannon) Daniel Parslow (Assistant Director) Faye Marshall (Lizzie) Aisling Sharkey (Niamh) Rex Hayes (Siobhan)
- “The new series will really make people stand up and pay attention to women’s football” – says Kas, who turned the actors into footballers
- “I hope it starts a conversation around how we deal with women’s health in sport and women wanting to be mothers” – says actor Faye Marsay
- “The transformation was incredible. They had been thrown into this from the get go” – said Kas
These are some of the largely-unknown actors who are about to become the most famous women’s football team in the world, Ted Lasso’s Lady Greyhounds in AFC Richmond.
Most of the Second Division team players have been plucked from obscurity with zero football playing experience and faced a gruelling transformation under the caring and inspirational methods of Ted Lasso and real-life football coach Kasali Casal
The ten episodes of the award-winning fourth series began today and can be seen on Apple TV+ and, according to those involved, will give a massive boost to lower-tier women’s football globally.
Kasali Casal had moved on to his next football project based around ‘discover the undiscovered’ and unearthing talented kids who, for one reason or another, may have slipped through the ‘system.’
His concept was well underway with various global interests and major financial support in Dubai when, as he describes, ‘world war three’ between the US and Iran broke out and scuppered his dream and his passion, at least for the time being.
Come May last year the unexpected call from Ted Lasso’s production co-ordinating chief Andrew Warren informs him Ted Lasso Season Four is a goer and it’s all hands on deck.
“I couldn’t believe it,” he recalls. “There had been talk about it and speculation in the media but we all knew Jason needed a break at the end of Season Three because he was just so tired. He is such an important cog which makes this wheel tick and he had been working seven years solid.”
Kas, who had played such a key role in crafting and perfecting the football skills of the AFC Richmond men’s team for the first three series, was told the new series would be built around a women’s team.
“Andrew told me it was going to be a women’s team. My eyes lit up and immediately said ‘yes.’ I think a lot of it was about the timing with women’s football booming but still struggling to breakthrough in so many ways when it deserves to.
“It’s still struggling for attention despite the success of The Lionesses in England and I think this will really make people stand up and pay attention.”
He introduced a gruelling three week ‘boot camp’ at Hayes & Yeading football club, in south west London after the actors had been selected by show creators Jason Sudeikis, who plays Ted and Brendan Hunt, who plays Coach Beard and who has an impressive football brain and devised the team’s preferred formation, which Kas will not reveal.
“This was different from the men. I was starting from scratch for most of them. A couple of them had played a bit when they were really young but they were very rusty. In some ways it was easier than the men.
“These girls wanted to learn, they listened, they practised and they didn’t just want to get it right, they wanted to get it perfect and that’s the effect Jason has on everyone working with him.
“They were on point and they didn’t want to make mistakes. They were so enthusiastic. They would say show me how to do this or how to do that.
“And when it came to filming they were so disciplined, we didn’t need nearly as many takes as we did with the men.
“As soon as they had the ball in front of their feet I could tell who had played before,” said Kas, who is a qualified UEFA A coach.
His new team faced serious opposition with professional teams like Chelsea, Wycombe Wanderers, AFC Wimbledon, QPR, Brentford and Reading lining up against them.
“It was not easy any means but they wanted to learn and they wanted to look the part,” he said. Faye Marsay, a football fan and player until a knee injury rule her out of competitive football, who plays Lizzie and Mercedes Assad were two of the actors who caught Kas’s eye had played before as well as street football girl ‘Shannon’ played by Shannon Hayes, who had a kickabout with Ted in previous series.
Faye, who has a child in the show, helps the storylines will highlight the challenges facing women struggling with careers and motherhood.
She said: “It’s a very small percentage of female athletes in the British Premier League who have children and players, so I hope it starts a conversation around how we deal with women’s health in sport and women wanting to be mothers.”
Kas described the boot camp as ‘intense’ for the girls with daily routines of drills, control and movement giving him the opportunity to ‘assess’ their skill levels and where he had to focus his work.
When Coach Beard, played by Brendan Hunt – a lifelong fan of Arsenal – had selected their positions Kas took the training up a notch to focus on the specific skills and positional responsibilities of each individual player as well as their interaction with team mates and their support roles.
“We could slowly see it come together and because of their positive attitude and collective commitment to strive for perfection it was almost magical when the team played and everything worked,” said Kas.
“The transformation was incredible. They had been thrown into this from they get go but they delivered and I’m just glad Jason trusted me to do the job he wanted.
“He is such a genius because of his attention to the fine detail and because it has to be right and when you know you cannot compromise those aims and values you know you have achieved something special.
“It’s always a risk to do something different or to do it in a different way but I know in my heart of hearts this is going to a be massive success, it will touch people like the other Seasons did in a different way and will bring a great deal of joy to a great number of people.”
Brendan Hunt is as passionate about the women’s game as the men’s game and hopes the show highlighting the funding issues especially for the lower league teams will change perceptions and improve facilities, salaries as well sponsorship opportunities more than ever.
He told TV Insider in the US: “Women’s football, particularly at the second division level, is under-funded. They have the good luck of being attached to a Premier League team, but still, they’ve got their own budget.
“And they don’t play in a big stadium. They play where the men train. Everything’s just rather humble all around. And being a brand new team, they also do not yet have the grassroots support of an affectionate community.
“To some degree they’re looked at with suspicion by the people of Richmond, who not entirely correctly fear that this team will drain resources from their beloved men’s team.
“So, they’re seen as outsiders in their own home. They’ve got to win people over, but they can’t just do it on their own. It’s going to take the whole club coming together to do it. And obviously a lot of that rests on PR and the things that Keeley does.”
Juno Temple, who plays PR guru Keeley Jones says: “I think it might be cool that people who are already fans of Ted Lasso and might not necessarily be fans of women’s football might have their eyes open to it and tune into it and so we might have just a handful of people who suddenly ‘oh I’m gonna watch a women’s game’ and I hope that’s something that this season will tap into and open their eyes to a whole, new endless joy of women’s football.”
Another British actor returning for Season Four is Jeremy Swift who plays Leslie Higgins, Director of Football Operations for AFC Richmond who said he hopes the new series will address the urgent need of support for women’s football ‘there’s a lot of lip service given to it because it’s new and exciting but it needs backing.’
YOU CAN SEE EPISODE 2 ON APPLE TV+ NEXT WEDNESDAY