FIFA 23 pits Ted Lasso against Ryan Reynolds’ soccer club, and it ain’t pretty
Ted Lasso vs. Deadpool! Bantr vs. TikTok! Who ya got?!
For FIFA 23, Jason Sudeikis’ fictional AFC Richmond joins Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney’s very real Wrexham AFC as celebrity “Rest of World” soccer clubs, the kinds of teams that, as a matter of authenticity, mayyyyybe shouldn’t be In The Game. But in the name of good-times fan service, they’re still here. So, naturally, I wanted to see which of these two made-for-TV sides would prevail.
It didn’t take 100 simulations to find out who’s better.
Wrexham AFC, which Reynolds (Free Guy, Detective Pikachu) and McElhenney (Mythic Quest, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia) acquired at the end of 2020, is the subject of Welcome to Wrexham, an 11-episode documentary that premiered on FX in August. A Welsh team, they play at the top level… of the semipro tier of the English football league. Last year, EA Sports did the celebrity duo a solid and put Wrexham AFC in FIFA22’s “Rest of World” grouping, the first time any out-of-league (i.e., not fully professional) club made the video game. The Dragons’ bargain seems to be that they’re shackled to a one-star rating, barely a match for the EFL League One and League Two sides in FIFA 23.
Lacking a real-world resume, the stars of AFC Richmond are free to shine much brighter, and thus, they are much better rated. They are a four-star team (out of five), competitive with the Barclays Premier League and clear of the stragglers who would be fighting to stay out of the Prem’s relegation zone. Yet in Ted Lasso season 1, the Greyhounds are demoted to the EFL Championship after losing their last fixture, and in season 2, they endure a seven-match stretch in which they draw with every opponent.
Maybe they aren’t four-star worthy, but they’ve
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