On the Podcast: Team USA’s Chris Richards on Preparing for His First World Cup

Reported by Vogue.

Chris Richards has never needed anyone's permission to dream big. The 26-year-old US Men's National Team defender grew up in Hoover, Alabama — a town where soccer culture runs deep enough that the same kids playing midfield on weekends were kicking field goals on Friday nights. When Richards told his teachers he planned to make a career of it, some of them laughed. "I just kept my head down and decided I wanted to prove them wrong," he said on Vogue's The Run-Through podcast. "And I think I've done pretty well at that."

He has. But the road to his first FIFA World Cup — set to kick off next week — hasn't been without turbulence. Richards is currently managing an ankle injury, spending his days doing strength work and reducing swelling, and he'll sit out the final warm-up match against Germany this weekend. The plan is to be match-ready when it counts. "It feels like everybody's still kind of holding their breath," he told hosts Taylor Antrim and Alyssa Hardy, according to Vogue.

The Education Abroad

What Richards found during his stints with Bayern Munich and Crystal Palace wasn't just elite-level football — it was himself. South London, he says, hit differently than he expected: familiar in its work ethic, rich in the kind of multicultural energy he genuinely wanted to absorb. "London is a beautiful place to find yourself," he said, crediting both the city and his teammates with shaping his personal style into something intentional rather than accidental. There's a particular confidence that comes from building an identity somewhere new, and Richards carries it.

Elsewhere in the episode, co-host Chloe shared her experience helping select the 10 finalists for the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund — a reminder that the intersection of sport and style has never been more culturally loaded. Co-host Chioma, meanwhile, returned from the three-day British Vogue Wellness Retreat at Estelle Manor in the Cotswolds, where conversations about women's health shared real estate with axe throwing and archery. She also crossed paths with Michelle Obama at SXSW London, which — honestly, that's the only sentence that needs to be written. And in the week's most romantic footnote: Dua Lipa and Callum Turner married at Marylebone Town Hall, the same venue where Chioma's own parents said their vows.

The throughline in all of it is the same thing Richards learned in Alabama: the people who don't believe in you are just noise, and showing up anyway is the whole answer.

Read the original at Vogue.