Sunflowers (Ted Lasso)

AFC Richmond loses 5–0 during a friendly game to AFC Ajax at the Johan Cruyff Arena in Amsterdam. Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham) is annoyed upon hearing the victorious Ajax supporters happily singing the club's anthem, "Three Little Birds" by Bob Marley and the Wailers. Seeing the club feeling dejected, Ted (Jason Sudeikis) tries to lift their spirits by imposing no curfew that night, allowing the team to spend the evening as they wish.

Roy (Brett Goldstein) forbids Jamie (Phil Dunster) from taking the night off, and instead takes him for training through Amsterdam, but is annoyed by Jamie's energetic attitude and knowledge of the city. When Roy mentions that he's never seen a windmill, Jamie buys stolen bicycles so they can go to see one; but Roy confesses that he never learned to ride a bike. Jamie teaches him, and although Roy struggles at first, the two eventually ride to the outskirts of the city and see a windmill.

Rebecca wants to spend time with Keeley (Juno Temple), but she leaves to see her girlfriend Jack in Norway. While walking in a bike lane, Rebecca is knocked off a bridge and falls into a canal. An onlooker (Matteo van der Grijn) invites her into his houseboat so she can shower and change her clothes; he cooks her dinner, they bond over deep conversations, and she falls asleep on his couch.

Higgins (Jeremy Swift) takes Will (Charlie Hiscock) to a jazz club to pay respects to Chet Baker. Will is delighted by the music and is also surprised by Higgins' skills when he is invited to join the band onstage.

The team is discussing what to do for their free night: some want to go to a sex show, while others want to attend a private party in Groningen, two hours' drive away. After a lengthy, inconclusive debate, they decide to hold a pillow fight at the hotel. During this, Colin (Billy Harris) heads to a gay bar, where he is followed by Trent (James Lance). Colin panics and leaves, until Trent assures him that he has known Colin is gay for months and never told anyone. He tells Colin about his own experience coming out to his family. Colin says that he wants to be able to kiss his boyfriend when he wins a match and not feel concerned about what others think.

Beard (Brendan Hunt) offers to help Ted get over his anxiety by sharing drugs with him, but Ted is unwilling to drink the drugged tea until after Beard has left. He visits the Van Gogh museum, where Van Gogh's paintings of sunflowers remind him of his home state of Kansas, and visits an American-style theme restaurant. While watching a recording of an old Chicago Bulls game, Ted begins to experience hallucinations inspired by Tex Winter's use of the triangle offense, and is inspired to develop a new football strategy.

The next morning, the club is ready to leave Amsterdam. Ted shows Beard his new tactic, which involves the players being prepared to take any position in the field; Beard notes that this strategy, Total Football, was first developed in Amsterdam in the 1970s, but agrees that the team should adopt it. All in high spirits, the rest of the club and Rebecca board the bus, which drives off as the club collectively sings "Three Little Birds".

"Sunflowers" received generally positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 100% approval rating for the episode, based on two reviews.[4]

Manuel Betancourt of The A.V. Club gave the episode a "B–" and wrote, "Clocking in past the hour mark, 'Sunflowers' captures both what makes the show great, yes — but also exactly why it's struggling in this final season as it caters to its own worst instincts. What began as a true ensemble comedy has slowly morphed into a series of disconnected storylines that only intermittently intersect, and 'Sunflowers' shows us why such an approach is producing diminishing returns."[5]

Keith Phipps of Vulture gave the episode a 4 star rating out of 5 and wrote, "We're now officially halfway through this season of Ted Lasso, so the aerial of this change-of-pace episode makes sense. By design or not, it also shakes up the season in a way that opens up possibilities for what's to come."[6] Paul Dailly of TV Fanatic gave the episode a 3.75 star rating out of 5 and wrote, "A trip to Amsterdam could have brought all the characters together, but thanks to the scattered nature of Ted Lasso Season 3, it was more of the same. 'Sunflowers' excelled in many areas, but keeping many characters apart as they search for meaning is beginning to stretch very thin."[7]

Christopher Orr of The New York Times wrote, "This was for me an odd and largely dissatisfying episode in addition to being, at over an hour, the longest episode to date. It felt an awful lot like the 'bottle episodes' added to the run late last season: 'Carol of the Bells' and 'Beard After Hours'. It is not, however, a bottle episode, as two characters' story lines move notably forward; it's just an episode that, apart from those characters, goes essentially nowhere. And did I mention it was really long?"[8] Fletcher Peters of The Daily Beast wrote, "Apart from this bizarre drug storyline, 'Sunflowers' is actually one of the better episodes of the season thus far."[9]

• "Sunflowers" at IMDb