Cristo Fernandez Returns to Professional Soccer After Ted Lasso Role Reignites Dream

Cristo Fernandez returns to professional soccer after spending three seasons as Dani Rojas, the relentlessly optimistic and dedicated player on Apple TV’s Ted Lasso. The 35-year-old actor has now stepped off the soundstage and onto a real professional pitch, making his debut for El Paso Locomotive FC in a USL Cup match against New Mexico United. Fernández entered as a substitute in the 79th minute of the 2-0 defeat for El Paso, a club that competes in the USL Championship, the second tier of men’s professional soccer in the United States.

Cristo Fernandez spent three seasons as Dani Rojas, the relentlessly optimistic and dedicated soccer player on Apple TV’s Ted Lasso. Now the 35-year-old actor has stepped off the sound stage and onto a real professional pitch, making his debut for El Paso Locomotive FC in the USL Championship, the second tier of men’s professional soccer in the United States.

The transition marks an unlikely return to a career Fernandez abandoned two decades earlier. As a teenager in Guadalajara, Mexico, he played professionally until a knee injury redirected his path toward acting. But his years immersed in the world of Ted Lasso, portraying a character who lived and breathed soccer, reignited a passion he thought had burned out. According to reporting from The New York Times, Fernandez completed a trial with Chicago Fire FC II before landing with El Paso, laying groundwork for what he describes as completing unfinished business rather than simply chasing a second act.

How Cristo Fernandez Returned to Professional Soccer

Fernandez has described the role of Dani Rojas as the catalyst for his unlikely return. For five or six years, he immersed himself in the training, fitness regimens, and mindset required to convincingly portray a professional athlete. The work went beyond surface-level acting; to look credible alongside actual soccer talent on set, he had to develop genuine athletic capability.

“With Ted Lasso, I had to be open to this new journey again,” Fernandez told The New York Times in an interview conducted shortly before his USL Championship debut. “Since we were playing professional soccer players, I had to at least look like a professional soccer player, and those three seasons and probably five, six years of being around this whole Ted Lasso journey, it started to bring this passion on me.”

Meeting world-class players during production also played a role. Fernandez encountered figures he had idolized as a younger player in Mexico, including Ronaldinho and Ronaldo, as well as Mexican soccer icons like Jorge Campos and Luis Hernández. Encountering these athletes in person reminded him what drew him to the sport in the first place. “Every single time someone tells me no, I just want to show you yes,” he explained, describing the drive that eventually pulled him back toward a sport he had tried to leave behind.

The Physical and Psychological Barrier

What separates Fernandez’s story from pure feel-good narrative is the reality of aging into a competitive sport. At 35, returning to professional soccer is not a typical trajectory. The human body does not grow younger, and muscle memory can only carry an athlete so far after two decades away from elite competition. Yet Fernandez framed the decision as one made with full awareness of the stakes.

“This is not me going in the field kicking the ball and then getting applause in the stadium,” he told The New York Times. “It’s really going and performing and being on the pitch. Just standing on a fútbol pitch, it requires so much effort.” He acknowledged that his acting career has not been easy, and neither is this next chapter. The three-year journey from initial interest to professional debut unfolded largely out of public view, without the media coverage that typically surrounds Entertainment news.

Why The Timing Matters For Entertainment And Sports Crossover

Fernandez’s move arrives as Ted Lasso itself shifts direction. The show is returning for a fourth season with a new premise: Lasso coaching a second-division women’s team in England rather than continuing the men’s storyline that made Dani Rojas a breakout character. Fernandez’s departure from the cast aligns with this narrative turn, but his decision to pursue soccer professionally speaks to something broader about the show’s cultural impact.

Ted Lasso spent three seasons celebrating soccer as a sport worthy of genuine passion and investment. While the show’s tone remained comedic and heartfelt, it portrayed professional soccer with respect and authenticity. For Fernandez, that daily immersion in the sport’s technical and emotional demands proved transformative. The boundary between playing a professional athlete and becoming one grew blurred through repetition and proximity.

What Comes Next Remains Uncertain

Fernandez’s debut with El Paso Locomotive FC represents a proof of concept, not a guaranteed path to sustained professional soccer employment. The USL Championship is competitive, and age is not on his side. What remains unknown is whether his trial period with Chicago Fire FC II and initial appearance with El Paso will translate into regular playing time, contract extension, or the career resurgence that would make this story complete rather than simply remarkable.

What is clear is that Fernandez has closed a door that professional injury forced shut decades ago. Whether he builds a new soccer career or returns to acting, he will have answered a question that haunted him since his knee gave out in Mexico. Like other athletes who have navigated the intersection of sports and entertainment, Fernandez has chosen to pursue both on his own terms, rather than accept the industry path expected of him.