John Barnes has been declared bankrupt just days after leaving Tranmere.
John Barnes, the former Liverpool and England winger, has been declared bankrupt by a Liverpool insolvency court only days after he was fired as manager of Tranmere Rovers.
Barnes, 45, gave his occupation as a 'provider of media services, lately a footballer'. He was declared insolvent and will be discharged on 14 October, 2010.
The hearing took place five days after Barnes' dismissal from Prenton Park, where his side lost eight of the 11 games under his control. Barnes had quit as manager of Jamaica in May to take over at the League One club, who are local to him.
It was the culmination of an unhappy career in management for Barnes, who had a lucrative playing career, winning 79 England caps and twice winning the Footballer of the Year award. He was still at Watford when he was first capped for England and after his golden years at Liverpool he moved to Newcastle in 1997 and appeared for them as a late substitute in the 1998 FA Cup final, becoming one of a handful of players to appear for three clubs in the Wembley showpiece game.
After finishing his playing days at Charlton Barnes moved to Celtic in tandem with Kenny Dalglish and had a disastrous spell in charge, culminating with an infamous defeat by Inverness Caledonian Thistle in the Scottish Cup in February 2000. He then worked as a pundit for ITV and ended up with his own show, John Barnes Football Night, on Five on Thursday evenings.
Barnes did achieve relative success with Jamaica, taking them to first place in the 2008 Caribbean Championships, but lost the Tranmere job after a 5–0 defeat at Millwall. The team have since won under the caretaker, Les Parry, who has been able to call on Zoumana Bakayogo, a French left-back from PSG who has been man of the match in both his games and who was unable to play due to a delay over his international clearance. "I owe John a lot as he took a chance on me by signing me and I wanted to repay his faith," he said.