Ted Lasso Quote
Coach Beard: At the 1974 World Cup, the tiny country of the Netherlands came out of nowhere and made it all the way to the World Cup Final, playing the home team, heavily favored Germany. Those Dutch hippies scored before the Germans even touched the ball.
Jan Maas: Yeah, but Holland lost that game.
Coach Beard: Correct. But along the way, they won the hearts of fans all around the world with a style of play... dare I say, a philosophy... called Total Football. Which, coincidentally, Coach dreamed up in a barbecue-sauce-related hallucination just last week.
Ted: No, it's true. But hey, it's not about me. Go on, keep shining.
Coach Beard: The best player on that team and the godfather of Total Football was this guy. Can anyone tell me who this is?
Isaac: That's Tim Robinson from I Think You Should Leave.
Coach Beard: No. It is Dutch football legend, Johan Cruyff.
Jan Maas: It's pronounced Cruijff.
Coach Beard: My apologies. With Total Football, Johan Cruijff...
Jan Maas: That's it.
Coach Beard: ...took his small club Ajax to three straight European titles. Now, he later became a coach, first at Ajax, and then he took Total Football to Barcelona, where he won the Spanish championship four years in a row. Now a central cog of that team was an industrious but brilliant midfielder named Josep Guardiola. AKA Pep.
Ted: Look at that head of hair. God had to take it away just to balance things out, you know?
Roy: Hmm.
Coach Beard: Pep became a coach as well, honing his own version of Total Football that he took to Barcelona and Bayern Munich, eventually landing at our great white whale, Manchester City. (players boo) Where he briefly coached a very talented young player... until that beautiful dum-dum quit to go do a reality show. (players laugh)
Jamie: I was robbed!
Coach Beard: Total Football is about constant movement. Players are no longer in set positions. Defenders are free to attack. Attackers are trusted to defend. It's about taking risks and supporting each other's choices.
Sam: Like when your friend wears something new and outside his comfort zone, and instead of ignoring it, everybody pays him a compliment. (players murmuring in agreement)
Colin: By the way, great hat, Ash.
Roy: It's pretty sweet. Hmm.
Ted: Yeah, it frames his face nicely.
Coach Beard: Exactly. Total Football is about letting go of your baggage and trusting your intuition. It's jazz. It's Motown. It's Mamet. It's Pinter. It's Einstein. It's Keurig. It's Gaga! It's my mother proudly displaying her vibrator on the bedside table! It's about throwing off the constraints put upon you by society and by yourselves! We all know football is life. But a beautiful life... is Total Football.
Quote from S03E07 - The Strings That Bind Us