The Times - UK (2022-02-21)

12 1GG Monday February 21 2022 | the times

thegame

Richards, who has made 13

appearances for Bayern this season,

including December’s Champions

League group games against

Barcelona. He has daily language

lessons and will be speaking in

German for an upcoming interview.

It has allowed Richards to join in

conversations with team-mates

more regularly.

Alphonso Davies and Jamal

Musiala are among his closest friends,

but Kimmich led the welcome party.

“From the first day he was really

helpful to me, always checking in on

me, like a big brother,” Richards says.

“He doesn’t have to do that. That’s so

In Bayern Munich’s bunker-like
meeting room at Säbener Strasse,
the new boy sat and waited. Omar
Richards was early and eager. It was
midsummer last year and he had been
in Munich for a few weeks, settling
into the city after a surprise move
from Berkshire with his mother,
Beverley, and brother Shakir, but
Richards was yet to meet the true
heavyweights of his new home.
Suddenly, into sight came Robert
Lewandowski and Leroy Sané, then
Thomas Müller and Manuel Neuer,
players who Richards only ever
expected to come into contact with
as virtual versions on the Fifa video
game, having felt his future at
Reading uncertain only a few
months earlier.
“I remember the first point of
contact was in the big meeting room,”
Richards says, his eyes lighting up as
he relives the memory. “I was sitting
in there and had been early. All these
people, all these names, people I’d
seen on TV and played with on Fifa
are all walking past high-fiving me,
and I’m thinking, ‘What is going
on? I must be in some dream
or something.’ ”
Moments of amazement have
occurred regularly for Richards over
the past nine months, since signing
for the six-times European champions
from relative obscurity at Reading.
Reality hits at random moments.
Sitting on the toilet or sightseeing in
Munich. Friends back home ask for
photographs of his jersey hanging
in the dressing room at
the Allianz Arena.
“Championship to
Champions League is
crazy,” they reply.
It is a remarkable story
and, over the course of the
next 40 minutes, the boy
from south London gives an
insight into his new life —
from defending against
Lewandowski to his
manager Julian
Nagelsmann’s
motorbikes, and the
support of “big
brother” Joshua
Kimmich to his
amusing reaction
when Bayern first
showed interest.
But, as with most
fairytales, Richards’s
road to Munich was
not without setbacks.
Today the 24-year-old
left back is sitting in
an office at Bayern’s
training ground but
the mention of

I didn’t know what was going to

happen from there.”

Beverley, as always, provided the

support. She had separated from

Richards’s father, Rohan, when he

was young and, although they

retained a good relationship it was

Beverley who raised Richards. She

worked for an IT company in Canary

Wharf, a short journey from the

family home in Catford, and would

rush back to take her two sons to

training in west London.

“It was a lot of pressure for her

but I think she lived for her kids and

she made sure we were there all the

time,” Richards says. “Seeing how

dedicated she was, it really spurred

me on to pursue this dream.”

Beverley drove him to trials, mostly

at clubs considered inferior to

Fulham, but found no luck. He was

“not good enough, too small, too

skinny, not ready. I heard everything

you could hear. So much

disappointment, until I thought,

‘Maybe this isn’t going to work.’ ”

Eamonn Dolan, the late academy

manager at Reading, took a chance

on Richards. “All of the negativity I

was getting, it’s funny because I think

it was the best thing that could have

happened to me,” he says. “By the

time I got to Reading I had a crazy

inner drive.”

Jaap Stam gave him his debut on

the opening day of the 2017 season,

aged 19, and Richards became a

regular within two years. All

was well but the outbreak of

Covid-19 and its impact on

football club finances filled

Richards with anxiety.

Reading had not

offered him a new

contract and he feared

being released into the

wilderness again. “Then,

my agent called and told

me Bayern Munich are

watching me, they’re interested, and

I’m thinking, ‘What? This can’t be

true.’ I almost put the phone down on

him. I literally didn’t believe it until I

got on a Zoom call with them.”

On the screen was Hasan

Salihamidzic, Bayern’s sporting

director, and Marco Neppe, the

technical director. They praised his

ability but wanted to see him use

skills to escape opponents in tight

spots. For a boy who grew up

watching Ronaldinho videos on

YouTube this was a welcome

request. Richards responded

and Bayern made their move.

He departed Reading,

where the threat of

relegation continues

to loom, with a points

deduction for

breaching financial

sustainability rules

and fan unrest over

the running of the

club. Richards

considers his

words carefully.

“I don’t want to

say anything bad

about Reading,” he

‘My agent told me

Bayern wanted me –

I almost hung up.. .’

Fulham instantly transports him to

the west London academy offices of

Motspur Park in 2013.

Richards joined the club aged nine,

signed up on the first day of a six-

week trial, but the first couple of years

were nothing more than steady. Aged

12, he began to progress rapidly and

was given a four-year contract.

“Everything is looking great,”

he says, softly. “We loved Fulham,

I’d moved to school in Fulham,

everything was Fulham for me.

I was even considering moving

over there. Then at 16, it all came

crumbling down.”

It’s scholarship day at Craven

Cottage. “Even thinking about it now,

I feel like I’m in that room,” he says.

“You’re sitting there and literally your

future is held in their hands in that

moment. You don’t know what’s going

to happen.

“They started to talk and were

saying, ‘Yeah, we think you’re good at

this, good at that,’ and then as soon as

they said, ‘But let’s not beat around

the bush,’ I knew it was all going bad

from there. ‘Let’s not beat around the

bush, you’re just not what we’re

looking for right now.’ That was the

crushing moment.

“I remember coming out of the

meeting, I was trying to hold it all

together, but I got into the car and

was in tears because I literally had

put so much into it and that was all I

knew at the time. It was my identity:

I played for Fulham. Everyone knew

that. And it was taken away from me.

says. “But now it’s more come to light

a bit what was going on at the time

and, I think, it explains why I wasn’t

offered a contract. While I was there,

and while it was happening, I didn’t

understand what was happening, so

I was really confused. I knew there

must have been some kind of

problems, like beyond my manager,

but I didn’t know what it was.

“I feel like they always found a

way, even going through those

hard moments, to survive in the

Championship. There is something in

that club. I reckon they’ll stay out of

trouble again. Hopefully, anyway.”

It is a distant memory now for

Omar Richards jumped

from Championship to

Champions League, he

tells Tom Roddy about

his ‘crazy’ Munich move

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Richards, below right, is lining

up for Bayern alongside

the likes of Lewandowski

Omar Richards

Bayern Munich

GIBRALTAR 21

PORTUGAL 2

FRANCE 5

BELGIUM 7 7

21

L (^2)
E 5
12 Monday February 21 2022 | the times