Ted Lasso's Nick Mohammed Explains Ending of Season 2 & Nate's Big Moment

There were some big moments for Nick Mohammed‘s Nate during season two of Ted Lasso, but he was the focus of the final seconds of the season finale and now he’s explaining that scene.

The 41-year-old Emmy-nominated actor is opening up about that big moment at the end of the season and what this possibly means for season three.

Click inside for spoilers and his quotes…

The rest of this post contains spoilers, so beware of reading any further…

In the penultimate episode of the season, we learned that Nate betrayed Ted by revealing to a reporter that the coach had a panic attack on the field, not food poisoning as previously claimed.

The reporter told Ted that Nate was the source and he was waiting for him to apologize throughout the entire finale. Finally, Nate confronted Ted and told the coach how he made him feel ignored and undervalued. He also shared his true feelings on Ted as a coach, calling him a “joke” and saying he didn’t belong there. After the big game in the finale, Nate rips up the “Believe” sign in the locker room as his resignation.

In a flash forward at the very end of the finale, we see that Nate is now the head coach of Rupert’s new team West Ham United.

While speaking with Collider, Nick talked about the fan reaction to the storyline.

“It was surreal and overwhelming, when it first started happening. It’s weird because Jason texted me literally this afternoon to check in that I was all right about the fan reaction. I was like, ‘Oh, God.’ It means that we’re doing our job correctly,” Nick said.

He added, “With the writing and the performance and the direction, we are meant to feel this about Nate. We’re meant to feel hate towards him. That’s correct. If fans are reacting that way, then it means that we’ve done our job in some small way. But it is weird because people are quite affronted, and rightly so, by some of the stuff that Nate has been doing. I absolutely don’t condone any of his actions.”

“Hopefully, particularly off the back of Episode 12, when people see it and when he lays into Ted and explains how he’s been feeling, you can at least see why he’s feeling like that. Not to justify it still, but at least there’s a little bit of a reason as to why Nate has been behaving in this way with a series of micro-aggressions and this sense of abandonment and this toxic relationship he has with his dad and not really having anyone that he can really truly confide in and who gives him any sense of real worth. It’s a sad story for Nate, it really is,” he said.

Nick revealed that they shot multiple versions of the final scene.

“I’ve not seen the final cut of Episode 12 yet. I know the shot that it ends on, but we shot a few variations of it. One was where he was quite smug and maybe a little bit happy and proud of himself. One of them, we see the horror in his eyes a little bit. So, I’m looking forward to seeing which one they used,” Nick said. “I would absolutely have chosen the one where there was an absolute uncertainty in his face because I think every time we’ve seen Nate look in the mirror, especially after he’s done something bad, we know that he hates himself. He really, really hates himself, I think, and that stems back to his insecurities and the toxic relationship with his dad and the sense of abandonment that he’s feeling and that he doesn’t have anyone he can open up to. He just doesn’t have friends. He doesn’t have a relationship with a partner, a girlfriend, or a boyfriend. He doesn’t have a pet. He needs some real love and strength and support in his life.”

Nick added, “He laid into Ted because he blamed Ted for that sense of loss, but it’s not Ted’s fault. It’s his dad’s fault, ultimately. In that final shot, he’s not happy because leaving Richmond FC and joining somewhere else doesn’t give him the fulfillment that he really needs. He might get to the top of the league that way and he might become this expert coach and he might become famous, but those aren’t the things that people want really, are they? So, if they’re gonna redeem Nate, and I genuinely don’t know if there’s a redemption arc or whether they’ll keep him as a villain, he’s got a long way to go.”

Nick was asked by Variety to explain what he hopes will happen in season three.

“The romantic part of me would love for it to be part of a redemption arc. I’d love to see a clash between West Ham and Richmond. It feels it’s inevitable, but whether that’s in the beginning, middle or end of the season, I don’t know. But I also want to know about Ted’s fate, about Keeley and Roy. There are so many things that are tantalizing about the season, it really feels like a middle season. They’re in the writers’ room at the moment, so it’s very exciting to see what they’re going to pull off,” he said.

The producer of Ted Lasso has revealed that these two actors will return for season 3 despite fans thinking they said goodbye already.