The long-awaited fourth season of Ted Lasso debuts on Apple TV next month, but the creator and star of the show already has his heart set on a fifth and sixth.

In a long feature by The Hollywood Reporter, Jason Sudeikis, who plays the role of the pathologically positive soccer coach, reflects on the process which brought him from closure after the third season (“The story was told,” he says. “Ted went home to be with his son. I wasn’t going to have Ted uproot their life to justify the money truck. It made no sense to me.”) to agreeing to make a fourth. And, perhaps surprisingly, he doesn’t want to stop there.

“If all goes according to plan, the Lasso team will be back in the writers room in late August mapping out a not-yet-ordered season five,” the Reporter reports. “Once again, Sudeikis has a three-season arc in mind, and he’s hopeful that the audience will still be there.”

That’s a three-season arc beginning with season four, of course. Whereas the first three seasons focused on men’s soccer, the new episodes will revolve around A.F.C. Richmond’s women’s team. That change means the arrival of new faces and the departure of others, which Sudeikis says required some “very difficult” phone calls.

Then again, the cast probably weren’t banking on more work anyway. The last episode of season three was released on May 31, 2023 and, officially at least, Ted Lasso was finished at that point. It always seemed likely that Apple would want to do something else with such popular, bankable IP, but it was clear that a change of direction would be needed after the resolution at the end of season three. The company is likely to be just as keen on further seasons as Sudeikis, but that will depend to some extent on the reception accorded to the new episodes.

Brett Goldstein, who plays Roy Kent in the show and is also one of its writers, is optimistic. “I think [season four] has some of that season one magic,” he says. We’ll have to wait and see.