Going to Blue Coat School in Liverpool, hanging up his boots at 30 and rising the ranks quickly as a coach, former Everton player Anthony Barry has had a very busy footballing career both on and off the pitch.
Barry is currently a coach at Chelsea, and if reports are to be believed he could be on the move to Germany in the near future. A report in The Telegraph has claimed that Barry has been asked to step back from his duties at Stamford Bridge as he looks sent to move to Bayern Munich.
Former Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel was appointed as successor to Julian Nagelsmann at Bayern last week, and spoke about his desire to bring Barry to Munich.
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"My coaching staff wasn't prepared either, so a big thank you to their families for their flexibility," said Tuchel at his unveiling as Bayern boss last Friday.
"Arno Michels and Zsolt Löw, who have been working with me for over ten years, will be there. We're hoping to add Anthony Barry, who is currently at Chelsea.”
Born in in May 1986, Barry was on the books of Everton U18s by the 04/05 season and gained enough experience to transfer to Coventry City’s reserves where he was a regular in the starting 11, although never made an appearance for the first team.
Accrington Stanley was next for Barry, where he made his first team debut and was a regular in the side in the first half of the 2005/06 season, making 26 appearances before moving on to Yeovil Town in January 2006. A two-year stint then followed which included an appearance at Wembley at the end of the 06/07 season, where he played in Town’s 2-1 defeat to Blackpool in the League One play off final.
The Scouser then went to the Welsh border and Chester, where he played 43 out of the 46 games in their relegation from League Two in the 08/09 season, which included his first league goal, a long-range strike against Lincoln in January of 09. The stint lasted another 12 months.
Arguably one of the most controversial moves a player can make then followed, with Barry crossing the Welsh border to sign with Chester’s bitter rivals Wrexham on an 18-month contract, which then ended after a week with the player asking to be released from his contract. The move reportedly didn’t go down well with Wrexham’s manager at the time Dean Saunders, buy Barry explained at the time: "Myself and Dean came to an amicable agreement and we left each other on good terms. My decision was entirely based on contractual matters because I was not unhappy at Wrexham and had thoroughly enjoyed my time there. But things happened behind the scenes and we agreed to go our separate ways."
He then joined Fleetwood Town where he made a great impact on the side, helping them to the Conference Premier play-off semi-finals and named in the 2010/11 Conference Premier team of the season. Even playing with Jamie Vardy, who finished the 2012 season as top scorer before moving to Leicester. Although at the end of the 2013 season, Fleetwood announced it wouldn’t be offering Barry a new contract and therefore he would be released.
The next club on the horizon was Forest Green Rovers, where he signed a three-year contract, scoring his first goal in an away defeat to Lincoln in August 2013. Although things went downhill during the 14/15 season, with Barry not making a single appearance for Rovers before transferring back to Accrington on a 93-day loan, which was then extended to the end of the season in January of 2015. Barry left Forest Green with three goals, the most he scored for any club he played for.
In 2016, Barry finished his playing career at the club where he spent the least amount of time in his first stint, Wrexham. This time it was a much longer stay, playing 31 games and scoring two goals in the 2016/17 season before being released by the Welsh club and then retiring from playing quickly after. He ended his career making 279 appearances, scoring eight goals for eight different clubs
While at Accrington, Barry was blighted by injuries in his mid 20s and during his lay-off, started to focus on coaching, quickly rising through the ranks and making his presence felt. He took the job of assistant to Paul Cook at Wigan Athletic in 2017, staying at the club for 155 games before leaving in 2020.
He then joined Chelsea’s backroom staff in 2020, serving under four different managers, even receiving praise from recently sacked manager Tuchel, who wrote in a Chelsea matchday programme: "I said after the Malmo game last week that it is a good sign when Andreas starts to score - and I think our set-piece coach, Anthony Barry, can be very, very proud."
In a recent interview, Barry commented: "I started to look into all different ways and eventually came to set-pieces - can we use free-kicks or throw-ins? - that’s where I landed at throw-ins and started to study them in more detail. Liverpool had just employed a throw-in coach that I’d read about and I just really wanted to know if they were that important or not.”
Barry has also been offered additional coaching jobs, firstly with the Republic of Ireland replacing Damien Duff and was also assistant to former Everton manager Roberto Martinez in the Belgium set-up at the World Cup.
Speaking to Training Ground Guru recently, Martinez praised Barry’s abilities and was delighted to have him on the coaching team ahead of the tournament, saying: “I came across Anthony Barry when he was at Wigan Athletic and he was a very impressive young coach at that point. I’ve followed him for a long time, then he moved to Chelsea and won the Champions League.
“He will bring to our set-up something very, very important ahead of the World Cup. I’m very happy with our technical staff. We have to work toward having the best possible technical staff we can have, to surround the talent of player in our team."
Barry even earned praise from Leicester player and Belgium international Youri Tielemans, who commented: “He’s been here for just a few days but has given our team intensity in training. This is purely an English mentality - or Irish - in training. He is known for being a set-piece master so we have worked on those.”
Barry has worked under former Everton manager Frank Lampard at Chelsea before Lampard moved to Goodison Park. According to the Daily Star, Lampard was impressed with Barry on a coaching course they did together.
