Ted Lasso Star Tries Out for USL Side, Could Sign Professional Contract

The actor behind Ted Lasso’s Dani Rojas could make his professional soccer debut in the coming weeks.

Cristo Fernández could switch his acting boots for soccer cleats. | Valerie Macon/AFP/Getty Images

Cristo Fernández, best known for his role as Dani Rojas in the hit Apple TV show Ted Lasso, is on trial with USL Championship side El Paso Locomotive FC—and could earn a contract that would turn fiction into reality.

The 35-year-old actor played 30 minutes for El Paso in a preseason friendly, per GOAL, and was pictured celebrating with his teammates following the clash. The United Soccer League outfit are now expected to make a decision on Fernández’s professional future before the start of the regular season this weekend.

Reports suggest that El Paso hasn’t been the only team where Fernández has logged minutes in recent weeks. ESPN indicate that the actor played for Chicago Fire II in recent weeks, even scoring a goal in a preseason friendly.

The man responsible for leading the line for Premier League side AFC Richmond in the hit TV show could now be doing the very same in real life for in U.S. soccer’s second tier, fulfilling a dream he had long before he decided to become an actor.

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Injuries Denied Cristo Fernandez Soccer Dream

Cristo Fernández has been in love with soccer long before appearing in Ted Lasso. | Joe Scarnici/FIFA/Getty Image

Born in Guadalajara, Mexico, Fernández fell in love with soccer from an early age and dreamt of becoming a professional player as a child. By the time he was a teenager, he was on the right path, until he suddenly wasn’t.

“I played for Estudiantes Tecos (a now extinct Liga MX side),” Fernández told ESPN in 2020. “I played in third [division], second, but injuries made me rethink a lot of things. I ended up playing in Puerto Rico’s first division and we were close to the Concacaf Champions Cup.”

Fernández spent time playing for Guayama FC in Puerto Rico, per the Los Angeles Times, before moving to the United Kingdom to pursue a masters degree in acting. Then came Ted Lasso, and Fernández reunited with the sport he loved so much growing up.

“Since I was little the first thing I did as soon I started walking was play soccer, like many of us in Mexico,” Fernández told Grupo Formula in 2021. “But then I wanted to get rid of soccer entirely because it was something that hurt me [after he gave up on trying to become a professional].

“It’s something I pursued and things didn’t go as I wanted. But regardless of how much I tried, soccer returned to me [through Ted Lasso] and here we are, that’s life, right?”

There are plenty of athletes that have pivoted and become successful actors. Now, Fernández is trying to become one of the few actors that pivot to become a professional athlete, following in the footsteps of the player his character in Ted Lasso is based on.

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The Inspiration of Javier ‘Chicharito’ Hernandez

Javier “Chicharito” Hernández became a Manchester United cult hero. | Tom Purslow/Manchester United/Getty Images

Fernández’s character in Ted Lasso, Rojas, like many others in the show, takes inspirations from real players. In Rojas’s case, he’s based on legendary Mexican striker Javier “Chicharito” Hernández, per IMDB.

“They ended up giving me the No. 14 shirt that Chicharito used to wear, people in [Ted Lasso’s] production remembered him a lot,” Fernández recalled.

Apart from wearing no. 14, Rojas, like Chicharito, is also a striker from Guadalajara, Mexico and at one point scores a goal with his face—like Hernández famously did when he scored for Manchester Unitetd against Chelsea in the 2010 FA Community Shield.

If Fernández’s real-life finishing abilities are anywhere close to Chicharito’s or his own Ted Lasso character, then he has a strong chance of signing that first professional contract.

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