Ted Lasso – Season 3 Episode 4 “Richmond vs West Ham” Recap & Review

Richmond vs West Ham

Episode 4 of Ted Lasso season 3 begins with Jamie being roused from a deep sleep by incessant knocking and ringing of his doorbell. He finds a surly Roy Kent at his door, ready to train him. It’s 4 o’clock in the morning. Jamie soon realises Roy was never joking about training from 4 am. He insists on three workouts a day if Jamie wants to be better than Zava. Jamie reluctantly goes back in to get his clothes on.

Nathan looks over a board of a football field with miniature players. He uses the ball to knock down the figure of Ted and smirks at it. But his smile fades and he picks the figure up and places it back on the board.

At Ted’s place, the coach wakes up to see Sassy getting dressed. As they chat, he suggests that they have a good time together and should go on a real date. She laughs it off and turns it down, saying Ted is too much of a mess at the moment. She’s a mess herself, but a few years down the line now. She says she likes how things are with them and they should stick to that.

Outside in the park, Roy sits on a bench and munches on breakfast as Jamie does 100 pushups.

In Keeley’s office, Rebecca fumes over Rupert’s latest comments about the upcoming match between Richmond and West Ham. Shandy enters and Keeley tells Rebecca how Shandy is handling a promotion for the dating app called Bantr by getting the single players from Richmond’s team to use it.

Rebecca fishes for information and finds out that Sam isn’t doing it. Barbara enters the office and asks Keeley for two tickets to the match with West Ham as she’s going to be attending with Jack. Keeley gets excited to hear more about this Jack but turns out Jack is the VP of the organisation that sponsored Keeley’s company, aka Keeley’s boss.

In the coach’s office, Roy and Beard tell Leslie about their strategy while playing against Nate, going in circles and trying to outthink him. They ultimately land on playing Nate’s false nine and having Zava drop back, the latter of which Leslie points out could be a problem. Ted enters to find a sombre mood in the room but changes the topic by asking if they think he’s a mess. As the diamond dogs take up their howling, Roy moves to his desk. Beard and Leslie both point out that Ted is a mess because he’s acting like Nate didn’t hurt him when he did. Ted insists Nate didn’t hurt him but even Roy calls bullshit.

While two commentators on the television make predictions for the match, the Richmond players react. Colin makes a gay joke that is observed by a keen-eyed Trent Crimm. Zava enters and tells everybody to ignore the faces on TV. A discussion about how to pronounce Zoreaux’s name ends with Zava proclaiming that people should choose their own names which is why he lets his kids choose theirs when they’re seven years old. Jamie pumps up the team as well, supported by Isaac who hits the ‘believe’ poster for good luck. To everybody’s shock, the poster splits in half and they realise that someone tore it in two.

Nathan paces outside the restaurant that he had once taken his parents to. He finally steps inside and speaks to Jade, the waitress who is unimpressed by his new fancy job. He orders his takeout, bragging about treating his staff, which also doesn’t have any effect. When the restaurant manager brings out his food he recognises Nate, gushes about him and even gives him the food for free.

Shandy guides the Richmond players into saying one liners for the Bantr promo, including Zoreaux who now goes by the name Van Damme. When it’s Jamie’s turn, Shandy asks Keeley about him. Keeley goes on about how he used to be insensitive and thoughtless but has changed. Shandy just wants to know if she can bang him.

Thanks to Trent Crimm, the coaches find a security video of Nate trying to tear down the Believe poster. He jumps, then uses a chair, falls down, climbs it again and finally rips the paper in two. They believe a video like this could motivate the team. Ted tells them to go home for the night.

Rupert sees Nathan working late and approaches him. When Nate seems unsure about meeting Ted, Rupert counsels him and says he’s done nothing wrong and encourages him to focus on beating him.

Ted looks through his chats with Dr Jacob, which only consist of reminder messages from the doctor about their counselling appointments. Rebecca arrives and tells Ted she really wants to win this one. She then asks if he’s okay, to which he opens up about the ‘mess’ comment. She says he is and advises him that Sassy is usually right about such things. She then asks if everything is okay and invokes their Oklahoma card to make sure he tells the truth. Ted admits he’s a “work in progmess”.

The day of the match arrives and the teams make their way in. Keeley and Rebecca arrive together but Keeley heads to the loo to make sure she looks okay. She’s worried about impressing Jack, the VP. Rebecca bumps into Rupert and his wife Bex. They exchange ‘friendly’ greetings and move on.

In the loo, Keeley realises she got her period and borrows a tampon from the woman in the next stall.

Ted enters the elevator and when most of the crowd leaves, finds Nathan trying, unsuccessfully, to hide himself in the corner. Ted is cheerful and approaches him as usual. Nate is about to say something about the way he left Richmond but the lift doors open and Rupert interrupts them.

Keeley rejoins Rebecca, Shandy, Barbara and Leslie to meet Jack, who turns out to be a woman. The same woman who gave her a tampon. When Rebecca makes a joke about getting drinks, Barbara laughs much harder than the others and Shandy notes how she seems to be obsessed with Rebecca.

In the local Richmond pub, someone enters wearing a West Ham jersey but Mae ruthlessly sends him out.

As the crowd in the stadium sing West Ham’s song, Ted approaches Nate but he stiffly shakes his hand and leaves. Coach Beard and Roy give Ted a look.

The match begins and West Ham don’t seem to be taking any risks. Zoreaux saves a goal and Jamie nearly scores one. Zaav was open but he didn’t pass to him. West Ham end up scoring a goal and just a minute before halftime, Nate tells the team to change up the strategy from defence to attack and they score one more.

Ted sees Rebecca waiting for him and tells the coaches to go in and talk to the team. Rebecca, very forcefully, tells him to not worry about the pressure from her and enjoy the game but her demeanour suggests otherwise. Ted returns to the team to find that the coaches showed them the video of Nate ripping the poster. The coaches think the anger will fuel them but it ends up making them reckless and violent, with several yellow and red cards and a final score of 4-1 that West Ham wins. Rebecca looks dejected and gets up to leave.

Zava talks about the match during an interview. On her way down, Rebecca sees Rupert flirting with and touching his secretary.

Roy and Beard admit they messed up and ask Ted to yell at them at the very least. He doesn’t. Instead, he tells them to shake it off as they have many more matches to go.

An interviewer asks Nathan about his snubbing Ted by not shaking his hand after the match but Nathan claims he got caught up in the excitement. He later sees Ted and Trent Crimm talking and is about to approach them but gets interrupted by Rupert’s secretary, who gives him the VIP card to an exclusive club.

Rebecca meets Bex and Rupert once again and leans in to tell Rupert that she saw him and his wife and daughter deserve better.

Keeley is speaking with Jack when Shandy comes up and tells her Bantr’s subscription has tripled thanks to the change in their bio line. She made it say “Want to bang a celebrity?” A startled Keeley tells her this is not what the brand wanted and asks her to change it back immediately while being very conscious of Jack watching it all.

Nathan gets an enthusiastic welcome at the club where Rupert introduces him to a famous woman named Anastasia.

Roy heads to Jamie’s house to wake him up for training but, to his surprise, Jamie is already up and ready to start.

At home, Ted listens to commentary about the match and looks at his Lego set with the tiny figure of Nathan. He makes a decision and calls Michelle, opening up to her about how he doesn’t like the thing with her and Jake and it ticks him off that they didn’t talk about it before it happened.

He felt it was important for him to tell her this. After the call, he seems more at peace and on the other end, Michelle smiles.

The Episode Review

Ted Lasso continues with its multitude of storylines and it’s working quite well to keep you wanting more. I love that the issue with Nate is what prompted Ted to open up to Michelle.

Watching one segue into the other was a nice touch, emphasizing how work and personal life is not so different. I’m still not keen on Rebecca’s feud with Rupert but Hannah Waddingham and her brilliant screen presence make up for all of it.

Keeley’s workplace issues are intriguing and it’s exciting to see her grapple with the pros and cons of being the boss. The positioning of Jack as a recurring character and someone to look out for is on shaky ground at the moment. She seems like a great character but adding on to an already full ensemble cast may not be wise.

Roy and Jamie — whether as reluctant friends, mentor and mentee, or colleagues — are simply a joy to watch. After Nathan’s stereotypical villainish attitude since Season 2, it’s refreshing to see him doubting himself.

Overall, Ted Lasso delivers a fantastic episode. Nothing underlines the Ted Lasso mantra more than the scene of a team of massive footballers getting enraged over the tearing of a yellow poster that reads ‘Believe’.