Marc Richards

Richards started his professional career at Blackburn Rovers, but was on the books of Conference side Hednesford Town before moving to Ewood Park. He made his Rovers debut under manager Graeme Souness in a 2–0 defeat to West Ham United at Upton Park in the League Cup on 31 October 2000; he was replaced by David Dunn after 68 minutes.[4]

He was taken on a one-month loan by Dario Gradi at First Division side Crewe Alexandra at the start of the 2001–02 season. There he scored his first career goal, in a League Cup victory against York City at Bootham Crescent on 21 August; his headed goal levelled the tie at 2–2 in extra-time, and he was subsequently booked for 'over celebrating', though this did not stop him going on to score the winning goal in the penalty shoot-out.[5] He left Gresty Road with one goal in five games, and in October 2001 joined Andy Ritchie's Second Division Oldham Athletic in another one-month spell. He played six games for Oldham, scoring once against Tranmere Rovers in the League Trophy, again with a header.[6] He spent two months on loan at Alan Little's Halifax Town from February 2002,[7] but remained goalless in his five games for the struggling Third Division club.

In November 2002, he went out to Swansea City on loan for the rest of the season. Brian Flynn's "Swans" avoided relegation out of the English Football League by just a single point, though Richards managed a respectable tally of seven goals in 17 games. He got his first league goal at Vetch Field on 30 November, again with a header, to wrap up a 2–0 victory over Shrewsbury Town.[8] On 15 February, he scored twice against Cambridge United, and also had a goal disallowed for offside.[9] He received his first sending off a week later, after reacting badly to a foul by Hartlepool United captain Michael Barron.[10] After discovering he was released from his contract at Blackburn in April 2003, Richards aimed to sign with Swansea permanently,[11] but instead signed a two-year deal with Northampton Town.[12]

Though he scored twice at Sixfields in the FA Cup victory over non-league Weston-super-Mare, it took 27 games before he bagged his first league goal for the "Cobblers". The goal finally came on 17 February 2004, in a 2–1 win at Darlington.[13] He then had one of the best games of his career on 27 March, when he scored all four goals of the game against Macclesfield Town within the opening 39 minutes.[14] Struggling with illness,[15] he scored in the play-off semi-finals against Mansfield Town, though his side crashed out on penalties.[16] He ended the 2003–04 campaign with 11 goals in 52 games.

His second season at Sixfields was one blighted by injury. Picking up a knee injury in September 2004,[17] he had recovered by November,[18] but after making his return he ruptured his knee ligament, keeping him out of action for a further three months.[19] In March 2005 he was returning to fitness,[20][21] and so was loaned out to Steve Parkin's Rochdale to aid with his recovery. After two goals in five games he returned to the "Cobblers".[22] Finding out he had no future at Northampton under Colin Calderwood, he had a trial with Bristol Rovers,[23] before joining Barnsley in August 2005.[24]

Described as "a young Neil Shipperley" by manager Andy Ritchie, his initial deal was short-term, so after fitting in well at the club he was offered an extension to his contract in December 2005.[25] In 2005–06, Barnsley were promoted to the Championship through the play-offs. He started the play-off Final victory over Swansea City at the Millennium Stadium, before being taken off for Tommy Wright after 70 minutes.[26] In total he played 41 of the "Tykes" 46 League One games during the campaign, and scored 12 goals.

In January 2007, he was due to sign with Port Vale, in part-exchange for Leon Constantine. However, he remained at Oakwell after the deal fell through.[27] He was released from his contract in May 2007,[28] despite making 37 appearances in the 2006–07 season.

In June 2007, Richards joined Port Vale on a two-year deal;[29] he was one of manager Martin Foyle's last signings. He became the club captain[30] and quickly established himself as one of the club's better players.[31] Richards suffered with an ankle injury during the 2007–08 season.[32] He recovered towards the end of the season and began to find his goalscoring form once again,[33] though this was not enough to save Lee Sinnott's "Valiants" from relegation out of League One. At the end of the season the club were forced to accept a £100,000 bid from Cheltenham Town due a release clause in his contract, though chairman Bill Bratt rated him as a £300,000 player.[34] Turning down the chance of a move, he instead signed a one-year contract extension to keep him at Vale Park until the summer of 2010.[35] He went through a spell of injuries and suspensions during the 2008–09 season which caused him to miss almost twenty matches for Dean Glover's side.[36] An Achilles injury picked up in late March kept him out of the team for the rest of the season.[37] Despite this his eleven goals made him the club's top scorer.

He lost the captain's armband in the 2009–10 season, when new manager Micky Adams gave the armband to new signing Tommy Fraser,[38] Richards being made vice-captain. However this did not seem to affect him in a negative way as he scored twice against Championship side Sheffield United to give Vale a shock 2–1 giant-killing victory in the League Cup First Round.[39] With a winning goal over Darlington the following weekend he took his tally to four goals in five games.[40] He was transfer listed in late September, along with the entire Port Vale squad, after manager Micky Adams saw his team slip to a third consecutive defeat.[41] Despite five goals in his first fourteen games of the season, Richards was targeted by the 'boo-boys' at Vale Park after a few weak performances. He claimed to be 'gutted' by the fan's lack of faith in his commitment.[42]

"Marc contributes because he holds the ball up well, he wins headers and brings other people into play, and he also scores goals. He may not have scored as many as he would like because every striker wants to score two or three a game. He's just got to work hard, because if you're not scoring goals I think the fans and management team want to see the players working their socks off. I've seen that from him all season and I don't think a lot of people understand how hard he works running those channels – and he gets battered from pillar to post."

— Vale assistant-boss Geoff Horsfield defended Richards from the minority of Vale fans who were impatient at the striker's mini-goal drought.[43]

Richards battles with Ben Herd in the Aldershot Town penalty area at Vale Park.

The striker found his scoring form by the season's mid-way point. He managed to equal his previous season best tally of twelve goals by January 2010. Despite this he told the press that he did not take a fresh contract in May for granted,[44] though Adams insisted that he would offer Richards a new contract.[45] On 13 March, Richards scored his first professional hat-trick in six years, during a 5–0 win over Chesterfield at Saltergate;[46][47] he scored with a lob, a long range strike with his left foot, and a header.[48] He finished the campaign with a tally of 22 goals – more than double his tally for the previous season, and was the club's top scorer for the second consecutive season. Richards was eager to stay at the club,[49] and signed a new contract to keep him in Burslem until the summer of 2012.[50] Adams was confident Richards would sign,[51] despite a lucrative offer from Carlisle United and interest from numerous League One and Scottish Football League sides.[52]

Before the start of the 2010–11 season, Richards set himself a target of thirty goals.[53] He quickly established a deadly strike partnership with new teammate, namesake Justin Richards.[54] Sent off against Burton Albion at the start of January 2011,[55] more damaging to Richards' golden boot hopes and Vale's promotion ambitions was news that he would be sidelined for six weeks with muscle tear in his thigh.[56][57] With Fraser and Adams leaving the club, new boss Jim Gannon handed Richards the captaincy in February 2011.[58] On 26 February, he marked his return from injury with a goal against Aldershot Town in a 2–1 win – his first goal in three months.[59] On 29 March he scored his 100th career goal, helping Vale to beat Lincoln City 2–1.[60][61][62] After hitting the twenty goal mark at the penultimate game of the season, Richards became the first Vale player to score twenty goals for two seasons running since Martin Foyle (the man who originally signed him for the club) in 1993–94 and 1994–95.[63]

Despite only turning 29 weeks before the start of the 2011–12 season, the departure of namesake Justin Richards left him as the club's most senior professional.[64] After scoring on the opening day against Crawley Town, Richards then spent a month on the sidelines with an ankle injury.[65] He made his return to the starting eleven against Plymouth Argyle on 10 September, only to end up with a straight red card and three match ban for an incident with Warren Feeney,[66] an incident the striker described as 'handbags'.[67] He returned to the first team on 1 October for only his fourth appearance of the campaign, and bagged both of Vale's goals against Rotherham United.[68] However, after a further six games he was sidelined again due to a recurrence of his ankle injury,[69] and had to wait until December before he returned to action.[70] The injury required surgery to fully heal, however Richards chose to postpone the operation in order to try to help the "Valiants" into an unlikely play-off spot.[71][72] Despite the club entering administration in March, Richards refused the opportunity to jump ship to promotion hopefuls Crawley Town.[73] The administrators also rejected a loan offer from Shrewsbury Town.[74] He finished the season with 17 goals in 36 games, thereby becoming the club's top scorer for the fourth season in a row.

After weeks of speculation, Richards signed a two-year deal with Chesterfield in May 2012.[75] Manager John Sheridan and Chief Executive Chris Turner persuaded Richards to make the switch to the League Two side after a multitude of meetings with the player and a large increase in wages.[75] He had a poor start to the 2012–13 season, as the "Spireites" struggled to perform; he also spent six weeks out injured with ankle troubles.[76] The club's fortunes began to improve though after Sheridan was sacked and replaced with Paul Cook.[76] Richards also began to regain his form, and scored five goals in his last five games to end the season on 12 goals in 37 appearances.

On 30 March 2014, he played at Wembley Stadium after coming on as a substitute for Sam Hird in Chesterfield's 3–1 defeat to Peterborough United in the final of the League Trophy.[77] He scored a total of eight goals in 46 games as the "Spireites" won promotion as divisional champions in 2013–14.

Richards playing for Northampton Town in 2014

On 14 May 2014, Richards signed a three-year contract with Chris Wilder's Northampton Town after rejecting a new deal at Chesterfield.[78] He said that he chose to stay in League Two because "I want to get as many promotions as I can before I hang my boots up".[79] He enjoyed an excellent start to the 2014–15 campaign, going on a spell of seven goals in five games and winning a place on the Football League team of the week for his brace in a 2–0 win at Dagenham & Redbridge on 6 September.[80] However he was then sidelined with hamstring problems.[81] He scored 18 goals in 36 appearances to finish as the "Cobblers" top-scorer in the 2014–15 season despite having two months out with an Achilles tear,[82] and was voted as the club's Player of the Year.[83]

Northampton were promoted as champions in 2015–16 under manager Chris Wilder, giving Richards his second League Two title in three years.[84] He finished as the club's top scorer with 18 goals in 37 appearances despite missing the second half of the season after undergoing surgery to correct another Achilles injury.[85] Wilder stated that he believed Richards would have scored 30 goals during the campaign if he had not been sidelined with injury.[86] Richards was reported to have advised chairman Kelvin Thomas to appoint Rob Page as Wilder's successor as manager in May 2016.[87] He scored 13 goals in 46 appearances in the 2016–17 season, and signed a new one-year contract in May 2017 after manager Justin Edinburgh described him as "a captain, a leader and someone who helps set the dressing room tone".[88] However he lost his first-team place under new manager Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and left the club by mutual consent on 15 January 2018.[89]

Following his release from Northampton on 15 January 2018, Richards joined League Two side Swindon Town on a one-and-half-year deal.[90] Five days later, he made his Swindon debut during their 3–1 away defeat against Coventry City, replacing Luke Norris in the 63rd minute.[91] He went onto score his first goals for the club a week later in their 4–3 victory over Crewe Alexandra, netting the opener in the 3rd minute, then completing Swindon's comeback in the 89th minute; he was named on the EFL team of the week and shared the EFL Star of the Day award with Timi Elšnik.[92][93] Following the month of February, in which Richards netted five times in six games, he was named as the EFL League Two Player of the Month for the first time in his playing career.[94] He scored 11 goals in 20 games for the "Robins", but he blamed the team's inconsistency for their failure to reach the play-offs by the end of the 2017–18 season.[95]

He picked up a shoulder injury playing in a pre-season game in July 2018 and manager Phil Brown reported that he would be out of action for at least two months.[96] On 31 January 2019, he travelled to former Port Vale in expectation of a last-minute transfer being arranged, but chairman Norman Smurthwaite blamed "logistical challenges" for the deal breaking down.[97] He had fallen out of favour under new Swindon manager Richie Wellens and admitted that "I either wasn't good enough or wasn't quite at the races in the first half of the year".[98] He was released by Swindon at the end of the 2018–19 season.[99]

On 5 August 2019, Richards signed a six-month contract with League Two club Cambridge United.[100] "U's" manager Colin Calderwood stated that: "We have now got Jabo Ibehre and Marc who bring a lot of experience and know-how at the latter stages of their careers, which ensures a good balance in the squad with the three younger strikers in Harvey Knibbs, Andrew Dallas and Sam Smith."[101] He scored three minutes into his first start for United, helping his side knock Championship side Brentford out of the EFL Cup on 13 August.[102] Four days later he scored in his first league start for the club, in a 2–1 victory at Colchester United.[103]

On 16 January 2020, Richards signed for National League side Yeovil Town on a contract until the end of the 2019–20 season.[104] He scored two goals in eight appearances for the "Glovers" in the 2019–20 season, which was permanently suspended on 26 March due to the COVID-19 pandemic in England, with Yeovil in fourth-place.[105] Yeovil entered the play-offs at the quarter-final stage, where they were beaten 2–0 by Barnet.[106]

On 22 August 2020, following the expiry of his contract with Yeovil Town, Richards signed for Southern League Premier Division Central side St Ives Town.[107]