A biography for John Barneshasn’t been written yet.
“I'm quite laid-back but some people say I'm unemotional. I don't get carried away with success and similarly I don't get depressed when something bad happens. I didn't take it personally when rival fans threw banana skins at me when I was playing for Liverpool. I can't control 50,000 idiots shouting at me, so why would it bother me?”
“Just passing laws saying you are not allowed to be racist won't work. You need an educational system in place.”
“White players always said to me: 'You can call me 'a white so and so,' I don't mind.' But that's because society has indoctrinated us over the past 400 years to think that that's like saying 'you handsome so and so.'”
“I don't differentiate between racism in football to racism in life so, therefore, as a football manager I knew that I would get racist abuse.”