How Chris Richards become USMNT's most important defender: 'I never wanted to be just a name on the teamsheet'

Richards has emerged as a key figure in the USMNT's back line under Mauricio Pochettino, both as a tactical and cultural fit in the team

Pardeep Cattry

Mar 26, 2026

6:44 pm ET

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11 min read

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For most modern-day soccer players, one day off was a treat but Chris Richards had the unique gift of multiple days of rest in early March, with which he did very little. He took a walk in a park near his south London home, listened on as his 15-month-old daughter was glued to "Ms. Rachel" and after the toddler went to bed, he caught up on the TV show "Fallout." He laid low on purpose – he was in the midst of the busiest season of his career as Crystal Palace balanced a domestic load with competition in the UEFA Conference League. With three months to go until the World Cup, it was only going to get more intense from here.

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't think about it all the time," Richards told CBS Sports earlier this month. "I try to compartmentalize especially being at Palace, you still have a lot to play for the season. I'm trying my best to take it day by day, but again, I want to make sure that I do everything possible to be there at the World Cup."

Few, if any, members of the U.S. men's national team are acting like locks for Mauricio Pochettino's World Cup roster but Richards is as close as it gets to a guarantee. The 25-year-old has become a regular fixture at Palace, paving the way for him to emerge as one of the USMNT's starters at center back. His rise was steady, his journey to becoming a reliable national team player almost mundane as he turned a stint in an MLS academy to a one-way ticket to Europe. His journey from Birmingham, Ala. to London, by way of Houston, Dallas, Munich and Sinsheim, Germany, was not exactly conventional, though.

"I shouldn't be here, if I'm being honest with you," he quipped.

Richards was cut from a trial at FC Dallas, landing instead at a youth club in Houston before the MLS club's academy came calling. Within two years of leaving Birmingham, he was on Bayern Munich's books, only to be relegated to the reserve team or sent on two separate loans to Hoffenheim. He was not an immediate starter at Palace, either, and first broke into the team as a defensive midfielder rather than his preferred center back role. Everything's coming up Richards, though, and not a moment too soon as a World Cup on home soil nears.

"I never wanted to be just a name on the teamsheet," he said. "I wanted to be one of the first ones in it."

Chris Richards, brick wall

Richards is a natural fit for Pochettino's version of the USMNT in more ways than one, perhaps primarily from a tactical sense. Pochettino's switch to a back three last September has paid dividends, the team so far unbeaten since the formation change five games ago. Richards, already a national team regular at that point, adapted quickly – he played in a back three frequently for Oliver Glasner's Palace, a perfect anchor as the USMNT began to put a year's worth of poor results behind them. As long as Richards and his colleagues in the back do their jobs, the strategy "allows you to put more creative players on the field as well and let them do their magic." It feels like an unglamorous trade-off but Richards insists there are perks for him, too.

"I love it," he said. "I think even for us defenders, it's a chance for us to be aggressive. When you're so far off the pitch, it's your time to smash into somebody and you win the ball up that high and then it really is a counterattack within 20 yards of goals. I really enjoy it. I really do."

On-field aggression is a common theme for this iteration of the USMNT, a defining ethos as Pochettino attempts to reenvision the group ahead of the World Cup. Richards' natural tendencies, then, are a perfect match for the team's intense identity.

"I think there's a lot of emphasis on ball-playing center backs but for me, my first role is to defend," he said. "Of course, I want to be able to play with the ball. I feel like I do pretty well but I think being able to usually defend and kind of completely eliminate the other team's best attacking threat, that makes me happier than anything. Now, I think to be a center defender, you have to be a little sick in the head, to be honest with you. You have to want to head the ball. You have to want to crunch people and pretty much, your job is that once you get the ball, to give to the people who go make the magic happen and so for me, like I said, my favorite thing in the world is to have like a crazy crunch tackle and everybody goes wild so I'd rather do that than score a goal. That's my job and I love it."

Richards has been foundational to Pochettino's reinvention of the national team, on the ground during vital moments on their road to the World Cup. That includes last summer's Concacaf Gold Cup, during which