MICAH RICHARDS has fired a warning to football’s budding superstars over the dangers of becoming rich overnight by revealing his worrying spending habits as a youngster.
The retired defender-turned-Sky Sports pundit burst onto the scene at Manchester City in 2005 – signing a big-money contract in the same year – aged just 17.
Richards revealed he came into so much money overnight he impulsively spent it.
The fan-favourite pundit bought supercars, a luxury mansion in the footballers’ paradise of Hale and even splashed out over £100,000 on a single night out.
Speaking to The Athletic, Richards explained: “Imagine going from £500 a week to £5,000 a week... and then going from £5,000 a week to £50,000 a week.
“Then you’d get bonuses, appearance money, a signing-on fee that was spread over the length of the contract.
“I remember one pay packet was like “£250,000 for a month. I was at the training ground, just looking at my payslip, thinking, ‘Wow. How?’
“What can you do? I know what I did. I went straight out and bought myself a Ferrari.
“I already had a Range Rover and an Aston Martin, but I thought, ‘It’s time’. I bought myself a Ferrari, an F430. Then a 458 Speciale.”;
But the spending didn’t stop with cars. Richards continued: “I started to look at houses in Hale.
FREE BETS AND SIGN UP DEALS – BEST NEW CUSTOMER OFFERS
“I bought this £3m, seven-bedroom house and I was living with two brothers, two cousins, my best mate.
“Where I was living was already more than enough, but this is what happens when you’re a footballer.
“It’s always, ‘Who has the best house? Who has the best car?’.
“You can never just be content. You’ve always got to want more.”;
Richards went on to reveal he would spend between £20,000 and £30,000 on nights out in London and Manchester.
And he remembers going even bigger during a lavish night out with pals in Los Angeles – a night which ultimately put an end to his outrageous spending.
On his LA party, Richards revealed: “That [night] was over $150,000 in a night...
“It was so over the top and we would be throwing in tips and we just wanted the biggest bottle [of Champagne] – it was just short of $100,000.
“And it was at that moment my mindset changed.
“I’d booked to go for a month, but I came home after three weeks, saying, ‘I can’t do this anymore. I can’t. I’m going to end up with no money’.”;
Richards would spend a decade in the Man City first-team after working his way through the youth ranks, helping the club win their first Premier League title in 2011-12.
He joined Aston Villa in 2015 but made just 26 top-flight appearances in four years before hanging up his boots in 2019.
In all, Richards earned 13 England caps between 2006 and 2012 – with ten of those coming in 2007.
