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John Barnes

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John Barnes
Personal information
Full name John Charles Bryan Barnes
Position(s) Midfielder

John Charles Bryan Barnes (born 7 November 1963 in Kingston, Jamaica) was a hugely successful and well known Jamaican-born English football player of the 1980s and 1990s with both Watford and Liverpool, and was once manager of Celtic.

Playing career

Watford

Having moved to England as a boy, Barnes was noticed by Watford whilst playing as a schoolboy for non-league Sudbury Court. After a successful game in Watford's reserves, Barnes was signed on the 14th July 1981 for the fee of a set of kit.

Barnes made his debut, at the tender age of 17, as a sub on the 5th September '81 in a 1-1 league draw with Oldham Athletic at Vicarage Road under manager and mentor Graham Taylor (who led the team through all four divisions).

Barnes and Watford gained promotion, as runners-up to fierce rivals Luton Town, to the top flight of English football at the end of the 1981/82 and went on to finish as runners-up for the League title, ironically, to Liverpool the following season. Watford then made the 1984 FA Cup final, where, as under-dogs, they were beaten 2-0 by Everton.

While featuring heavily in Watford's rise to prominence, which included a UEFA Cup campaign in 1983, Barnes' dazzling skills and electric pace on the left flank made him a hero with his adoring fans and were quickly spotted by England manager Bobby Robson, who gave him his debut on the 28th May 1983 putting him on as a second half replacement for club mate Luther Blissett as England drew 0-0 with Northern Ireland in a British Championship match at Windsor Park, Belfast.

The 10th June 1984 will always be a day to remember for Barnes, he scored one of the most breathtaking individual goals ever seen, when he outpaced and out-thought several Brazilian defenders before rounding the goalkeeper and slotting the ball into an empty net during a friendly match at the famous Estádio do Maracanã Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. The goal brought him worldwide fame but also a sense of heavy expectation, with unreasonable observers and supporters expecting him to produce moments like that on a match-by-match basis.

Indeed, Barnes' whole England career, despite its decade's longevity, was seen by many as a disappointment. England's most capped black player won 79 caps and scored 12 goals, but compared to his club form, he was never seen as a player who peaked when wearing an England shirt. Nevertheless, he remained in the top ten most capped players list for eleven years until David Beckham and then Gary Neville edged him out from ninth to 11th.

Robson did not use Barnes at the 1986 World Cup until the quarter final against Argentina when England were trailing 2-0 with 15 minutes to go. Barnes used his short period on the pitch to destroy the Argentine defence time and again (BBC commentator Barry Davies famously shouted: "Go on! Run at them!" when Barnes was given the ball), setting up one goal for Gary Lineker and laying on another chance which, despite seeming easier than the one he scored, thanks to some inspired Argentine defending Lineker conspired to miss. England went out of the competition, but Barnes' impact on the team and the country was felt.

Liverpool

A year later after appearing 292 times for the Hornets, scoring 83 goals, Barnes left Watford on the 9th June 1987 in a £900,000 deal for Kenny Dalglish's Liverpool, joining at the same time as England team-mate Peter Beardsley and linking up with John Aldridge and then Ian Rush to form one of the most formidable attacking lines of Liverpool's illustrious history. Barnes made his debut for the Reds, along with Beardsley, on the 15th August '87 in the 2-1 league win over Arsenal at Highbury, it took just 9 minutes for Barnes and Beardsley to show just what was in store for the Anfield faithful, as they combined to set up Aldridge for an excellent team goal. Barnes' first strike for the club came a month later on the 12th September as the Reds beat Oxford United 2-0 at Anfield, Aldridge had aldready scored against his former employers in the 13th minutes before Barnes scored in the 37th minute to make the game safe.

In his first season at Anfield, Barnes was outstanding as Liverpool coasted to the League title, remaining undefeated for the first 29 games of the season and ending up with just two defeats, though again he would suffer FA Cup disappointment when Wimbledon surprisingly beat the champions 1-0 in the final. Barnes had performed a memorable (not necessarily for the right reasons) rap on the club's traditional Cup final song Anfield Rap, which got to No.3 in the UK charts.

Barnes, like everyone else at Anfield, was given a nickname, what with Dallas being one of the leading TV programmes of the time and one of the characters names being Digger Barnes, it was an easy call to give him the nickname 'Digger,' this has stuck with him and is also how the Liverpool fans affectionately refer to him.

The success and disappointment of the '87/88 season were reversed a year later, with Liverpool winning the FA Cup with a 3-2 defeat over Merseyside rivals Everton, with Barnes instrumental during the extra time period, but losing the title to Arsenal with literally seconds remaining.

Barnes,in his early years at Liverpool, was having to deal with racist abuse from opposing supporters and far-right groups — a famous photograph was once taken of Barnes, in full Liverpool kit and mid-match, casually backheeling away a banana which had been hurled at him. In his early England days, he and fellow black player Mark Chamberlain were subjected to threats from racist groups. Notably, Barnes was abused by supporters of the National Front on the plane back from South America in June 1984; the racists claimed that England had only won 1-0 against Brazil because Barnes' wonder goal "didn't count".

Barnes played in the 1990 title winning side at Liverpool and scored an amazing 22 league goals from the left wing. Liverpool striking legend, and colleague, Ian Rush also had a great season but managed 4 fewer league goals than Barnes, putting into a larger context just how prolific and important Barnes was to Liverpool at the time. He then appeared in the World Cup for England. He sustained a groin injury against Belgium shortly after having a magnificent volleyed goal wrongly disallowed for offside. England went out to Germany on penalties in the semi-final. Barnes had again supplied a rap for a tie-in song, "World In Motion" by New Order, which was a UK No.1 and is still regarded by many as the best football song ever made.

Barnes continued to play for Liverpool and England, and started the 1990-91 season in scintillating form, despite frequent barracking from opposition fans who were frustrated with his lack of product in an England shirt. His response was frightening though as the likes of Aston Villa, Manchester United, Wimbledon FC and Leeds United found out as Barnes scored spectaular goal after goal for the Liverpool cause. The resignation of the legendary Dalglish however was a blow that Liverpool did not recover from for more than a decade. The great club suffered a demise as Manchester United supplanted Liverpool as the dominant English team, and it was more than coincidence that Barnes' own demise can be traced back to this point. He did however win the FA Cup again in 1992 despite missing the final with an Achilles injury. Around this time, he was booed by a section of England supporters at Wembley after a poor performance by the whole team - somehow, Barnes' own perceived underachievement throughout his international career was seen as a symbol for England's own ineptitude as a team that evening. It was also this pre-season (in 1992) where constant injuries would eventually take their toll and rob Barnes of the lightning acceleration and pace that was once his hallmark.

By the mid-1990s, Barnes knew he was facing the end of his playing career and looked to make up for the underachievement at International level with his club side. He publicly stated that he would stay at Liverpool and nurture promising young talent that needed his leadership instead of leaving the club as it went through turbulent years under Graeme Souness, before Roy Evans took over at the helm in 1994. Under Evans, Barnes and his young proteges like his favoured successor, Steve McManaman, fellow central midfielder Jamie Redknapp and striker Robbie Fowler won the League Cup with Liverpool in 1995. Barnes had now been converted into a holding midfielder where he, Redknapp and McManaman would pass their way through teams and set up countless goals for the likes of Fowler. However, it is probable that a lack of a tough-tackling central midfielder at this time prevented Liverpool from ever winning the league championship under Evans, and it is in some quarters considered probable that Evans (formerly Kenny Dalglish's number 2) had stayed loyal to a fault - to the ageing Barnes. However due to an injury to fullback Rob Jones it is also considered by other sections of Liverpool fans that it was Evans subsequent tactical formation of a 5 man defence with wing-backs behind and beside 3 midfield players, that was the real and only flaw in what was technically a very good side, one always revolving around the Barnes, Redknapp, McManaman fulcrum.

After 12 years of international recognition Barnes won the last of his 79 caps on the 6th September 1995 in the memorable 0-0 friendly draw with Colombia at, fittingly, Wembley. The goalless friendly will always be remembered because of the eccentric Colombian goalkeepers, Rene Higuita, 'Scorpion Kick.'

He managed one more FA Cup runners-up medal before narrowly losing out on the FA Premiership title to Manchester United a year later in 1997. On the 13th August that same year, after 407 appearances and 108 goals, Barnes decided it was time to leave Anfield and joined up with former boss Kenny Dalglish at Newcastle United. He reached yet another FA Cup final (defeated again) during his short period at St James' Park Barnes made 41 appearances and scored 7 times before ending his playing career at Charlton Athletic where he played just 12 times starting twice.

Post-playing Career

Barnes had racked up an impressive 754 appearances, for 4 clubs, scoring 198 goals before, in a 'dream ticket' style move, he then became coach of Celtic with Kenny Dalglish as director of football. This much-hyped appointment was disappointing, and included a shock Scottish Cup defeat at the hands of Inverness Caledonian Thistle. Barnes was sacked as a result. He has since become a pundit on ITV and is currently a presenter of the football coverage on five as well as having his own weekly football discussion show on LFC TV called The John Barnes Show, every Thursday. He also works as an ambassador for Save the Children.

Twice in his career, Barnes was voted Football Writers' Association Footballer of the Year. He has also won the PFA Players' Player of the Year and is widely regarded as among the most talented players to wear an England shirt. Barnes was inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame in 2005 in recognition of his contribution to the English game. He is separated and has two sons and two daughters.

The Liverpool fans adoration for Digger was emphasised when he finished in the top 5 of the poll 100 Players Who Shook The Kop which was conducted by the official Liverpool Football Club web site in the summer of 2006. More than 110,000 supporters worldwide voted for their 10 favourite players of all time, Barnes finished 5th behind Robbie Fowler (4th), Ian Rush (3rd), Steven Gerrard (2nd) and the man that signed him twice Kenny Dalglish (1st).

He is to compete in the fifth BBC series of Strictly Come Dancing starting in October 2007. His dance partner will be Nicole Cutler.

Managerial career

Celtic

Barnes succeeded Jozef Venglos at Celtic when he was appointed player-manager in 1999 by newly appointed Director of Football Kenny Dalglish. He was given significant financial backing from the Celtic board allowing him to make signings such as Eyal Berkovic (£5.75m a then Scottish record fee) and promising young Bulgarian midfielder Stilian Petrov (£2.2m) leading to the Scottish media to dub the set-up the 'Dream Team'. Despite a promising start in which some attractive and high scoring football was played (Celtic 7-0 Aberdeen, SPL Record Score) the 'Dream Team' was to turn into a nightmare for Barnes and Celtic. Naive tactics, loss of star player Henrik Larsson to injury combined to see a poor run of results over the late 1999 period. By this time most of the new signings had failed to settle with Eyal Berkovic and Petrov far from their best form and other players such as Bobby Petta, Ian Wright, Dmitiri Kharine, Olivier Tebily and £4.5m Brazilian defender Rafael Scheidt failing to make an impact. As a result Barnes was forced to abandon his audacious 4-2-2-2 formation for a 3-5-2 and rely heavily on players inherited from his predecessor such as Viduka, Moravcik and Mjällby.

Despite leading Celtic into the semi-finals of the League Cup poor league performances had resulted in Rangers gaining significant ground on Celtic in the League race. Barnes had by now lost the confidence of the Celtic fans and become somewhat of a joke figure among the media and Scottish football fans. Things were to come to a head for Barnes in the 3rd round Scottish Cup tie at Celtic Park against then First Division side Inverness Caledonian Thistle. The game, which ended up 3-1 to the visitors was to be regarded as one of the worst results in the clubs history. At half time, with Celtic trailing 2-1 there was a dressing room bust-up resulting in goalkeeper Jonathon Gould throwing his gloves at Barnes and Mark Viduka refusing to take part in the second half. Barnes had clearly now lost the confidence and control of the playing staff as well as fans and media. The following afternoon the Celtic board terminated Barnes' contract with immediate effect along with backroom staff Terry McDermott and Eric Black.

In a 2004 BBC interview Barnes was to claim he was sacked due to his skin colour rather than his performance as manager. The claims forced Celtic to issue a press release totally refuting the suggestion and iterating it his sacking was a result of "...three words Inverness, Caledonian, Thistle." His somewhat turbulant time in charge at Celtic and subsequent and unfounded claims of racism have lead to Barnes being regarded with much hostility by the Celtic fans. Despite being player-manager he failed to make any first team appearances for the Hoops.

Honours

As player

Watford

Runner Up

Liverpool

Winner

Runner Up

Newcastle United

Runner Up

England

  • 1983-1995 79 caps 12 goals

Individual


Personal Life

John was first married to Suzy and they have 4 children - Jamie 22, Jordan 19, Jemma 14 and Jasmin 11 (2007).

John's second wife is called Andrea and they have 2 children - Isabella and Tia.

Trivia

  • Barnes appeared on the 1990 England World Cup theme song World in Motion by New Order. This was a couple of years after he had been the most memorable 'rapper' in Liverpool's song released for their FA Cup final with Wimbledon FC, in 1988.
  • A film about Barnes' career was made in 1998, broadcast on BBC's The A - Force, it was produced and directed by Pogus Caesar a respected producer and director of multi cultural TV programmes.
  • Barnes visited Tanzania alongside Warren Barton and Les Ferdinand in January 2007 and played for youth side in Dar es salaam against other local clubs.
  • Barnes played for the Liverpool XI against the Rock XI in Gibraltar in October of 2006. He is set to play for the England XI against the Rock XI again on June 11th.

Managerial stats

Team Nat From To Record
G W L D Win %
Celtic Scotland June 10 1999 February 10 2000 29 19 8 2 65.51

External links

Template:S-awards
Sporting positions
Preceded by Liverpool F.C. captain
1996–1997 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Celtic F.C. Manager
1999–2000 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Football Writers' Association Footballer of the Year
1988 		Succeeded by
PFA Players' Player of the Year
1988 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Football Writers' Association Footballer of the Year
1990 		Succeeded by
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