John Barnes: Jamaican icon in English football
A trendsetter, John Barnes spent the majority of his playing career at Watford and Liverpool
John Barnes was born in Kingston, Jamaica
Barnes played 79 games for England, and scored 11 goals
His international debut, against Brazil, was marked by a sensational goal
Jayanta Oinam After playing at the highest level for nearly two decades, John Barnes retired in 1999 at Charlton Athletic. And many still ask: “Just how good was John Barnes?” To start with, he is a legend. He had everything: speed, power, the ability to dribble past opponents and a knack for scoring goals. A tally of more than 150 goals, the majority of those coming during his Watford and Liverpool stints will attest to that fact. There were also 11 goals that he scored for England. The Jamaican-born was one of the finest English wingers ever.
Or this will do – a solo run and a sublime finish that rattled Brazil in front of a packed Maracana during England's tour of South America in 1984. That goal alone helped England forget the pain of missing out on the 1984 European championship by a single point, behind Denmark. Then he was only 20. But as fate would have it, John Barnes didn't play for Jamaica even though he still carried a Jamaican passport. In 2008, he took up the role of head coach for Jamaica. Talking about his missed chance to represent Jamaica, Barnes told The Jamaica Star: “So as stupid as it seems, the only reason I played for England was because they were the first to ask. They were the biggest and the best country, but if Scotland had asked me first I wouldn’t have thought I would be good enough to play for England. You go and play for Scotland.”
Considered among the greatest ever players to play for Liverpool, John Barnes would often run their rivals ragged. But that was only one facet of his game. With age, he evolved, and became a mercurial playmaker, orchestrating every move, marking every inch of the ground his assured presence. At Anfield, for a decade, he was an unmissable act, the ‘Digger’ as the fans called him. Elsewhere, he was the epitome of professionalism. But what made John Barnes such an enduring figure was the fact that he was more than a footballer – he as a symbol of hope to the many who have chosen England as their home. John Barnes was born in Kingston to a Trinidadian father and a Jamaican mother in 1963. His father was a Colonel in the British army, and the family moved to England when he was 12. In his own words, Barnes grew up as “a quintessential child of the empire, descended from two former colonies,” and he was “brought up to believe in a Churchillian attitude toward Britain’s past.” A “black and from the Caribbean”, he “was raised to believe in the glory of an empire where the sun never set.”
But that empire, history will tell, has a dark past too, especially the abhorrent racism. And John Barnes confronted every shade of it with grace and humility without ever losing his "Blackness". For instance, Barnes back-heeling a banana off the field during a Merseyside derby remains arguably the best response to racism. Graceful, that's what he has been all his life. “When it’s going well, when you’re performing, you’re a superstar – the discrimination melts into the background. When you play badly, when you miss a penalty – as we saw with our team at Euro 2020 – racism rears its ugly head,” he wrote in a column for the Independent in 2022. “In one moment, a kid from Jamaica can be a celebrated symbol of an English city; in another, we can be told that we do not even have the right to be here.”
A gifted athlete, John Barnes started his career at Stowe Boys Club in London as a teenager and made his senior debut in 1981 in the Second Division for Graham Taylor's fast-raising Watford as a 17-year-old. Barnes played his part in Watford's promotion to First Division in 1982, and they finished second behind Liverpool in the top flight the following season. After spending six years at Vicarage Road, and playing more than 200 games, he moved to Liverpool in a dream deal, joining Kenny Dalglish's Reds in 1987. In the process, he became only the second black player to play for Liverpool. In his first season, he scored 15 goals, thus establishing himself as one of the greats of the game. And many more followed. There, he lifted the domestic league title twice and won a couple of FA Cups. He also turned up for Newcastle United, from 1997 to 1999, before joining Charlton Athletic.
John Barnes made his England debut in 1983, under Bobby Robson. He was only the seventh black player to play for England. And Barnes marked his debut with that sensational goal against Brazil. But he didn't really flourish in England colours, making only 79 appearances, including at the 1986 World Cup and 1988 Euro. After retirement, Barnes became a coach, briefly managing Celtic, the Jamaican national team and Tranmere Rovers. He is today considered one of the game's leading statesmen, talking about racism. One of his contemporaries, of Jamaican heritage, who shone in English football was Robbie Earle. A midfield maestro, the Newcastle-born Earle was Port Vale and Wimbledon in a career spanning more than two decades. And he represented Jamaica, the country of his parents, in eight matches, getting the call-up rather belatedly at the age of 32, but just in time to score Reggae Boyz’s first goal in a World Cup Finals match.