Rovers fire football legend John Barnes
Former Liverpool and England star sacked by Tranmere
Oct 11, 2009
John Barnes lasted less than four months as the manager of Tranmere Rovers. After leading his new team to a disastrous 22nd in League One, the Board decided they’d had enough and sacked both Barnes and his Assistant Manager, Jason McAteer. Under his charge, Rovers achieved two wins in eleven league games. They had the worst goal difference in English league football. Only an even poorer Wycombe team – who also sacked their manager recently – and Southampton, who had begun the campaign on minus ten points, were beneath them in the table.
The initial appointment of Barnes was surrounded in controversy. His predecessor at Prenton Park was Ronnie Moore, an unglamorous veteran of lower league football who was steadily turning Tranmere into promotion contenders. In 2008/09, they were challenging for the playoffs until the last match of the season. The Birkenhead club was upwardly mobile yet attendances were dropping, a likely consequence of the recession. Chairman Peter Johnson saw things differently, summarily sacking Moore and calling for change. ‘Now is the right time to move forward in a new direction,’ he told the Wirral Globe, and clearly saw a glamour appointment as the way to go.
Barnes was a Liverpool and England regular
Enter Barnes, a Merseyside legend who had starred for Liverpool during their last days as a mainstay at the top of the league. The winger was also a regular selection for the England sides of the late eighties and early nineties. Though his stellar club form didn’t always replicate itself on the international stage, Barnes was nevertheless considered to be one of the foremost attacking midfielders of his generation. Skilled, articulate and having overcome the adversity of playing during the casual terrace racism of the era, he was the England star picked to rap during his country’s anthem for the World Cup in 1990, performing with New Order. Later, a high profile contract with Lucozade kept his face on British television screens.
As his playing career wound down, Barnes looked next to management, and was appointed boss of Glasgow Celtic in 1999 in partnership with Kenny Dalglish, who was to be his Director of Football. Dubbed a ‘dream ticket’, the pair in fact oversaw a nightmare period for the Bhoys, during which they fell behind Rangers in the race for the Scottish Premiership and, in the game that saw Barnes dismissed, lost to Inverness Caledonian Thistle in a Cup match. In total, he lasted eight months at Parkhead.
Barnes after the Celtic disaster
Barnes’s reputation was so damaged by his Celtic experience that it took him the best part of a decade to find another managerial position. Punditry followed, and as he returned to living in Merseyside he hosted his own series on the subscription channel, Liverpool FC TV, imaginatively called The John Barnes Show. After running a series of coaching clinics in the Caribbean (Barnes was born in Kingston, Jamaica) he took the managerial post of the Jamaican national football team in 2008, with largely successful results. This gave him a springboard back into club management, and the eventual Tranmere appointment.
No doubt, Johnson wanted a new manager who could produce similar results to John Aldridge’s time in charge. A fellow Liverpool legend, Aldridge had maintained Rovers as a competitive force in the second tier for some years. His success never looked like being emulated by Barnes, however. A run of six successive defeats was bad enough. Worse came with his 5-0 loss at the hands of Millwall, a side that had previously scored seven goals in ten games. With form like that, he was ever under pressure. Other results simply didn’t go his way. Losing 2-1 to Walsall at home, an equaliser from Alan Mahon threatened to give Tranmere a share of the spoils before Troy Deeney’s late winner for the visitors snatched the points.
Problems at Prenton Park
Less obvious than the poor results was the financial situation within which Barnes had to operate. With access to the treasury denied, any changes he could make to the squad were limited. In addition, Rovers sold a string of first team players in the summer of 2009, including Mark Allott, the 32-year old midfielder who joined Rovers in July only to be shifted on to Chesterfield four weeks later in order to ease the wage bill. Barnes was left to cope with youngsters and anyone who could be drafted in at the cost of buttons.
This has led to increased calls against Johnson, who many perceive to be bleeding the club white via financial constraints, and failing to improve the situation by making ham-fisted decisions such as replacing a proven manager like Moore with the inexperienced Barnes-McAteer partnership. The pair might not have done much good whilst in charge. Critics cited their confusing tactics and Barnes’s willingness to hang his players out to dry after a bad match as proof of their ineptness. But ultimately, who’s to blame for giving them an opportunity in the first place? When the team was crying out for a careful, guiding influence, what they got was someone new to the job, and struggling exactly as you expect a man in his position to perform.
All that’s in the past, with Barnes and McAteer gone, and physiotherapist Les Parry put in temporary charge whilst Johnson seeks a permanent replacement. But have the troubles for Tranmere ended? Amidst the usual slew of names linked with the post, a strong rumour has it that Johnson aims to offer the job to yet another Liverpool playing legend, Robbie Fowler. Like Barnes, Fowler has no previous record in management. He could turn out to be another Aldridge, but the Chairman’s favouring of ‘glamour gaffers’ may lead to a whole new set of problems.
