'Ted Lasso' Sent Roy Kent to Chelsea. Brendan Hunt Calls It 'Wiggle Room.'

Hunt, who co-wrote the Apple TV finale, says Season 5 hasn't been officially ordered and no writers room has been opened.

Roy Kent quit AFC Richmond in the "Ted Lasso" Season 4 finale to take over Chelsea, his old team.

Brendan Hunt co-created the Apple TV comedy, plays Coach Beard and co-wrote the finale with Jason Sudeikis. He told Deadline that the exit isn't the goodbye it looks like. The show doesn't expect to lose Roy or Keeley, who's back with Roy and is played by Juno Temple, he said. What the episode built in is "wiggle room."

That's as much about scheduling as story. Brett Goldstein, who plays Roy, created, executive produces and stars in "Escorted," a new Amazon comedy. He's also on Apple TV's "Shrinking" and has a movie career. Hunt said the finale nods to how busy Goldstein is, and that with two actors that booked, leaving some slack was the smart move. Whether Roy and Keeley stay at the center of the show, he said, nobody knows yet.

That's because nobody knows whether there's a next season. Deadline told Hunt it had heard a Season 5 order was close. He said that was news to him. "I certainly hope it happens, and I'm optimistic," Hunt told Deadline, but he said nothing official had come through.

Ted's job changed too. In the finale, he told Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham) he was stepping away as manager of the women's team. On his recommendation, Alice Chilton (Tanya Reynolds) moved up to head coach, and Ted and Beard became her assistants. Hunt said the reason is Ted's son, Henry, whose games Ted had promised to stop missing. He also wondered aloud whether Ted can really handle someone else giving the orders, and said it might be harder than Ted expects.

The original Richmond men's team, which fans have wanted to see more of, mostly showed up in the finale as cameos. Hunt called their appearance a "passing-of-the-torch moment" from the men to the women. Asked whether viewers should care who manages the men now, he said he wasn't sure they do. He added that the show loves Nick Mohammed, whose Nate had just resurfaced. Deadline asked whether Phil Dunster's Jamie Tartt skipped the scene because of Dunster's HBO series "Rooster." Hunt said the reason was story logic: Jamie plays in Barcelona, and viewers had already seen him in Episode 6.

Tracey Ullman's Zelda, the season's most divisive character, lost the shareholder fight. Her henchman Hugo switched sides and brought the Milk sisters' shares to Rebecca. Add the 2% Mae left Rebecca in her will, and Rebecca now controls 51% of the club. Zelda keeps a minority stake. Hunt said the show loves Ullman but isn't "plot-obligated" to put Zelda in every episode.

One return the writers wanted didn't happen. Hunt said in another part of the Deadline interview that the team had considered bringing back Anthony Head, the late actor who played the villain Rupert Mannion, for the finale.

Every other door is still open, and none of them can be used yet. Hunt said Apple can approve a writers room before it orders a season, as it did ahead of Season 2. So far it hasn't done either. Until it does, Roy's way back from Chelsea exists only as wiggle room.

Source: Deadline, retrieved October 8, 2026.