JOHN BARNES aims to apply the ideas he took from two contrasting but successful football regimes at Liverpool and Watford to the task of guiding Tranmere through the forthcoming League One season.

The former England winger, fresh from a short and successful spell coaching the Jamaican national team, is one month into his first job in domestic club management since he left Celtic almost a decade ago.

He will be working with a trimmed down squad and under tight budgetary controls as Rovers grapple with the financial pressures caused by the recession and falling revenue through the gates.

But those constraints have not dampened Barnes’ enthusiasm for the job – or diminished his faith in the belief that lessons learned over 10 years at Anfield and under the guidance of Graham Taylor at Watford can be of value at Prenton Park.

Barnes said: “Of course we are not going to play football like Liverpool because we are not Liverpool. But we will be playing a passing game. We will try to keep the ball.

“I can’t see why teams in this division can’t control the ball, pass and keep the ball for 10 to 20 passes. There’s no reason why they can’t.

“Too many people put limitations on what other people can do – because they are their own limitations. They say: you can’t do that in this division.

“Well I will decide what the players can do and the players will decide what they can do. There’s no reason why we can’t do it if we believe we can. We have the quality to do it. We just need the belief.”

Barnes was among the most gifted players in a multi-talented Liverpool team between 1987 and 1997, under managers such as Kenny Dalglish, Graeme Souness and Roy Evans.

But in his early years at Watford, he experienced success in a team that climbed the divisions using more direct methods, utilising the brilliant organisational skills of Taylor.