Caring Hands Behind England New Boy’s Meteoric Rise

Paul Cook has been name-checked as a mentor to a key member of the England backroom team being assembled by Thomas Tuchel.

Anthony Barry spent three seasons in the Wigan dug-out with the ex-Wolves midfielder from 2017, the two having been colleagues at Accrington almost 20 years ago.

And it was Stanley’s long-serving former manager, John Coleman, who reminded the football world in an interview on BBC 5Live yesterday that Cook had helped shape the little-known 38-year-old who will become assistant manager to the national team on January 1.

All three are Liverpudlians and Coleman and Cook are both former Sligo bosses, their closeness further explaining why the Molineux favourite’s part in Barry’s development was highlighted on the airwaves following the Tuchel announcement. 

Cook gave the 5ft 7in Barry his big break in coaching when taking him on at the JJB Stadium at the end of a playing career spent in non-League and basement-division football.

The then 31-year-old had hopped between Yeovil, Chester, Forest Green, Fleetwood, Wrexham and others after failing to make the grade at Everton and Coventry but, having been troubled by injuries, found his true calling on the other side of the white line.

He came to be seen as a set-piece specialist and the Irish Times reports today that it was a dissertation on throw-ins while sharing a coaching course with Frank Lampard at St George’s that earned him a summons to work at Chelsea in 2020 around the time Cook was appointed by Ipswich.

Barry was retained by Tuchel at Stamford Bridge after Lampard’s departure and then taken by him to Bayern Munich for a buy-out fee of close to £1m.

International work on the side has come with Belgium, Portugal and the Republic of Ireland along the way and he went to the Qatar World Cup with Roberto Martinez’s squad.

It is a meteoric rise for someone who admits his playing days were underwhelming and comes while Cook continues to make an excellent impact of his own in management.

His Chesterfield side have started reasonably back in the Football League following their runaway title-winning success in the National League and stand in mid-table with three wins, six draws and only two defeats from their first 11 games.