The U.S. men’s national team will reveal its World Cup roster next week, and that tight timeline is not looking good for Chris Richards.
The Crystal Palace center back has been out for over a month with a hamstring injury, and according to his boss at club level, he’s only just begun workouts separate from the team.
“Chris has started doing some work outside but he didn’t do any kind of training with the team yet,” said Patrick Vieira in quotes published by The Athletic. “What is important is about him physically, there is a step he has to go through and at the moment he hasn’t done any kind of training with the squad.”
Vieira added that he is following guidance from club doctors, giving them the final say on whether Richards is cleared to train or not.
“The decision is not going to be mine but with the doctor we have to decide as a club what is best for the club,” said the former Arsenal and France midfielder, who reportedly indicated that he plans to speak with USMNT head coach Gregg Berhalter in the near future.
Richards the latest concern
As is the case with many national teams, injuries are starting to pose more and more of a conundrum for the USMNT.
A healthy Richards seems like a strong bet to make Berhalter’s 26-man squad, and possibly even start in Qatar. However, it’s not known how severe his hamstring issue is, and the USMNT is 17 days away from kicking off against Wales.
Given that center backs are generally counted on to play the full 90 minutes if at all possible, Richards likely needs to go beyond being fit enough to play some minutes, and get to a place where he can reliably play a full match.
If Richards were the only concern, the situation wouldn’t be ideal for the USMNT. Instead, the list long enough that we need to break out the bullet points:
- This past Sunday, Weston McKennie was ruled out for at least 15 days with a thigh issue suffered against Lecce
- The recovery timeline Celta Vigo provided for Luca de la Torre’s thigh strain leaves virtually no room for any setbacks
- Matt Turner was kept out of two Arsenal games for precautionary reasons due to a groin strain, which can be a notoriously tricky injury when it comes from moving to “iffy” up to 100%
- Cameron Carter-Vickers was left out of Celtic’s squad to face Real Madrid mid-week with an unspecified soreness
- On Friday, Josh Sargent was cleared to play by Norwich, (hopefully) overcoming a calf injury in time to face Rotherham on Saturday
That list doesn’t include the long-term injury Miles Robinson suffered a few months ago, and it doesn’t account for any of the bad news to come between today and the final two rounds of club matches before players report to the USMNT.
In other words, it’s gonna be a long, nervous couple of weeks before that flight to Qatar lifts off.
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