Richard Rios: how did he go from playing barefoot in futsal to the heart of the union?

Richard Ríos is a Colombian midfielder. Now 26, he was born in the Colombian city of Vegachí on 2 June 2000.

Growing up in desperate circumstances, Ríos turned to sport as a way out. Football, the game he loved to watch, was his first choice.

But the young Colombian couldn't break through. Fierce competition slashed his chances of climbing to the higher levels, so he switched to futsal instead.

Even so, Ríos couldn't escape the hardship. Things got so bad that he played some matches barefoot.

Money was so tight that he couldn't even follow the 2012 World Cup in Thailand on television, despite being a futsal player himself.

Rios stuck with futsal until he was 18, when it became his unlikely route into professional football, the opposite of everything he had first mapped out.

The turning point came in 2018. Colombia's under-20 futsal side travelled to Brazil for a friendly tournament, and Rios put his ability and potential on full display, catching the eye of every observer in the building.

Flamengo saw enough. The Brazilian club called Rios up for a trial period before signing him officially.

Everything changed for Richard Rios in that moment. His futsal career ended, yet its influence has stayed with him to this day, by his own admission.

Rios told the official website of FIFA: "Most of what I do on the pitch stems from futsal, whether it's putting my foot on the ball, control, possession, dealing with one-against-one situations, or executing one-twos."

"I can think faster than others in tight spaces, and I believe football involves a lot of that. These small battles may be the things you have to master in order to win the match," he added.

In January 2021, Flamengo decided to promote Richard Ríos to the first team, before loaning him out to Mexican club Mazatlán in the summer of that same year.

Mexico brought the biggest setback of the Colombian's career. He sustained a knee injury that kept him off the pitch for 7 months.

As the new season began, Ríos went hunting for a fresh start. He landed at Guaraní, a club scrapping in the Brazilian second division and fighting to avoid the drop to the third.

He kept them up. His displays also caught the eye of Palmeiras, who signed him in March 2023, and there he wrote one of the finest chapters of his career.

The Colombian shone at Palmeiras, driving them to the Brazilian league title in 2023. Across 138 appearances he scored 11 goals and set up another 10.

Those displays earned Ríos his first Colombia call-up in October 2023. Less than a year later, he was a regular at the 2024 Copa América.

Ríos played all six matches and helped fire Colombia to the final, where they lost to Argentina by a single goal in extra time.

Consider the turnaround. Just 18 months before that Copa América final, Ríos was turning out for a side scrapping to avoid relegation from the Brazilian second division.

At the Copa América, Richard Ríos caught the eye with his technical quality and his goal in the 5-0 quarter-final rout of Panama.

The strike itself wasn't what got people talking. It was the celebration. Ríos broke into the same dance he performs whenever he scores, wherever he plays.

The craze went so far that the Colombian city of Amalfi staged a children's dance competition named "Richard Ríos", with the prize going to whoever best imitated the midfielder's goal celebration.

Benfica gambled on Richard Rios in the summer of 2025, signing the midfielder from Palmeiras for a reported 16 million euros.

The Colombian repaid that faith across a busy campaign. He featured in 51 matches in all competitions for the Portuguese club, scoring 8 goals and providing 7 assists as they lifted the domestic Super Cup.

Rios's story in Lisbon proved short-lived, though. Benfica agreed to loan him to Al-Ittihad in the current summer window but refused to include a purchase option, keeping the door open to bring him back at the end of the season.

Now Rios must add value in midfield. The Saudi side lack players with his special touches, particularly with Algerian star Houssem Aouar's levels on the slide.

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