LIVERPOOL legend John Barnes will be in Zimbabwe on Thursday courtesy of Standard Chartered Bank, NewsDay Sport can exclusively reveal.
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The Jamaican-born English former footballer and manager currently works as a commentator and pundit for ESPN and SuperSport TV channels.
Standard Chartered Zimbabwe will be hosting a variety of events including a client cocktail and Barnes will also get the opportunity to interact with local soccer academies and motivate some young soccer fans. He will participate in the practice/coaching sessions of AYSA soccer academy.
Standard Chartered Bank has been the main sponsor of Liverpool Football Club (LFC) since July 2010. The partnership allows the bank access to some of the most successful players in football, past and present, in order to create a host of unique experiences for customers and clients around the world.
Ralph Watungwa, CEO of Standard Chartered Bank Zimbabwe, said: “The club has a similar heritage to us – over 100 years of history, strong values and a determination to give back to the local community. The visit by John Barnes to Zimbabwe is important in ensuring that the young and upcoming soccer stars are inspired.”
Standard Chartered has partnered with LFC on a number of community initiatives. For example, over 2 000 children have been taught football and life skills via joint soccer clinics around the world, thousands of people heard the bank’s “Living with HIV” messages when they teamed up with the club for World Aids Day 2012, and millions of dollars have been raised for “Seeing is Believing (SiB)” via the Bank’s Perfect Match campaign, whereby LFC swapped the Standard Chartered logo on their shirts for the SiB logo for two matches.
Liverpool — the most successful British club in Europe — are currently second in the English Premier League and with a realistic chance of finally returning to the Uefa Champions League where they last participated in 2009.
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The Reds are owned by the Fenway Sports Group, owned by John W Henry and Tom Werner, while American basketball star LeBron James of Miami Heat, is one of the shareholders at Liverpool.
During his playing career, Barnes had successful periods at Watford and Liverpool in the 1980s and 1990s, winning the First Division twice, the FA Cup twice, and playing for England 79 times (at the time, a record for a black player).
After a period at Newcastle United, he ended his playing career at Charlton Athletic in 1999.
After retiring as a player, Barnes had a brief stint as head coach of Celtic in 1999–2000, working alongside Kenny Dalglish. He took over as manager of the Jamaica national team in 2008, but resigned six months later to become manager at Tranmere Rovers. He was sacked by Tranmere in 2009, after a series of poor results.Barnes was one of the high-profile speakers at the Soccerex Africa Forum in Durban last year.
