John Barnes has been drawn into a Twitter debate about his brief reign as Celtic manager- and provided a number of revelations about his seven month stint in charge.
Straight from the first team squad at Charlton in 1999 Barnes took up the job as manager on the recommendation of Kenny Dalglish who took on the newly created role of Direct of Football. Jock Brown has left his position as General Manager the previous season.
Dimitrei Kharine was Barnes first signing, followed by Bobby Petta, Olivier Tebily and Eyal Berkovic with Stan Petrov arriving after a Work Permit was agreed.
Most disastrously was the signing of Rafael Scheidt for around £6m, one of the strangest signings in Celtic’s history. At the time Barnes admitted that he hadn’t watched the defender play, his international caps came in pre-season friendlies with even his age up for debate Scheidt started two Celtic matches, made three substitute appearances before being loaned back to Brazil by Martin O’Neill within a year of his five year Celtic contract.
Scheidt arrived during the Winter Break but after a draw at Kilmarnock and home defeats from Hearts and Inverness Caley Thistle, Barnes was sacked with Dalglish taking over as caretaker manager.
Barnes has been in the media a lot over the last fortnight highlighting the lack of black managers in football. That fact can’t be questioned but it was results, as Tony Mowbray discovered a decade later that decide your fate in management.
It took Barnes another decade to get a job in management- after 14 matches and just three wins he was sacked by Tranmere. At Celtic he won 19, drew 2 and lost 8 of his 29 games in charge.
Stu Liam petrol who no one heard off and Bobby PETA … both turned out to be great celtic players but no one knew them before.. Berkovic was the only big money signing… and Raphael shide wasn’t my signing at all and never played for me as he had his appendix out https://t.co/FvQKShPEEa
— John Barnes (@officialbarnesy) June 10, 2020
Petrol, I presume he means Petrov.
Anyway … anyone… I was a shit celtic manager, fine, explain why other shit celtic managers with worse records were given longer than me… forget Martin O’Neil and the other successful ones .. just us “shit” ones. https://t.co/DC41Mhltpt
— John Barnes (@officialbarnesy) June 10, 2020
So from winning manager of the month in January … remember… check it out.. to losing next game beginning of feb to being sacked?!?! https://t.co/2zlh86oOyc
— John Barnes (@officialbarnesy) June 10, 2020
Manager of the Month for January? Not after a 1-1 draw at Kilmarnock followed by a 3-2 home defeat from Hearts prior to the Calay Thistle home defeat.
How long was he manger for? https://t.co/2zlh86oOyc
— John Barnes (@officialbarnesy) June 10, 2020
Mowbray lasted a month longer than Barnes.
Quality singings when given the money and they had faith in O’Neil from the beginning… anyway this isn’t about me I’m talking about all black managers. https://t.co/8nvV3f7gSJ
— John Barnes (@officialbarnesy) June 10, 2020
It was only Kenny who insisted the board didn’t, so they really didn’t want me there in the 1st place… the players knew that so as soon as things got sticky u saw the outcome https://t.co/29bhrjxTjc
— John Barnes (@officialbarnesy) June 10, 2020
Other managers with worse records being given longer… why?? https://t.co/rpPZeBGEuc
— John Barnes (@officialbarnesy) June 10, 2020