Richards, who’s from Birmingham, Ala., has won a host of championships during his professional career, including the UEFA Conference League—two tiers below the Champions League—this season with Crystal Palace, plus an FA Cup, England’s annual countrywide knockout tournament, and a Community Shield, the game pitting the Premier League champ and the FA Cup winner against each other, with the Eagles in 2025. As a center back, Richards plays a sort of middle-linebacker role on defense, in charge of seeing the entire field and shouting directions at his fellow back-line players. “He manages the game well, he reads the game well,” says former U.S. World Cup defender Marcelo Balboa, the lead Major League Soccer (MLS) Spanish-language analyst for Apple TV. “He’s a guy that can lay a tackle for you, he’s a guy that can win a header between a group. He’s also not afraid to go forward.”
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