Has to make you laugh reading online Twitter twats tell The John Barnes he's out of touch, or doesn't understand racism just because he disagrees. As if blackness is a hegemonic hive mind, that doesn't have Tories or isn't 4 years removed from an amazingly charismatic leader drone bombing weddings.
It does not need reiterating on this forum, because we all know it, but I'm going to say it anyway. John walked into a club that did chant "Liverpool are white", had bananas hurled at him on live TV, and was consistently blamed for any national team failures on his "laziness".
He was the best player in the world between 87-89, the best player in the best team this country has ever seen and was an absolute model in dignity, grace and his capacity to rise above the constant humiliation black folks suffered in an era when murdering Stephen Lawrence on the straight was a vaguely 50/50 call.
The guy is a God. An absolute God.
And is good natured on a level that almost beggars belief.