Just as Jack Grealish is struggling for game time at Manchester City, so too is his alter ego in popular TV series Ted Lasso.
The Emmy-winning Apple TV+ comedy about an American “soccer” coach working with an ailing Premier League club is set to return for a fourth series.
But the man viewers most loved to hate, AFC Richmond “star man” Jamie Tartt - who is loosely based on Aston Villa hero Grealish, despite his Manchester accent - will only get a bit-part role in the new series, which has just been announced.
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Fans of the show, starring Jason Sudeikis and Hannah Waddingham, had been crying out for a fourth series, but it seemed their pleas had fallen on deaf ears.
With Ted (Sudeikis) back in Kansas with his wife and young son, and an unlikely Premier League trophy safely ensconced in the Richmond boardroom, it seemed the series had run its course.
But co-creator Sudeikis himself let slip that series 4 was in the works - with Ted now running a women’s football team. And it seems all the old cast will be returning - with the exception of Tartt actor Phil Dunster, who will only be able to take part in cameo roles after being one of the main protagonists in the first three series.
Reports suggest appearances by the Northampton-born actor will be limited because of clashes with other filming commitments, arguably a classic art mirroring life situation as Grealish struggles to regain his starring role for four-times champions Manchester City.
While Tartt is an amalgamation of several Premier League stars, Dunster has admitted that Grealish, the Villa academy product sold to the Etihad for a record £100m in the summer of 2021, was a major influence in his characterisation of the role.
He said recently: "Being a big football fan myself, I was careful not to make it too heavily one person. There are obvious parallels to Jack Grealish, our Lord and Saviour, but there's an element of lots of other players in there, too.
"There's James Madison, for the sort of footballing brain, and for being kind of outspoken and a brilliant like showman, and Cristiano Ronaldo, for the showboating..."
