Joey Barton is a reformed character... no wonder Harry Redknapp believes his midfield heartbeat can become a manager



Barton was integral to Queens Park Rangers' promotion

Ex-Newcastle bad boy has reformed his character

Barton is seeking redemption in the Premier League with QPR next year



Let me tell you two things you didn’t know about Joey Barton.



Firstly, I was the person who engineered his meeting with Morrissey at Glastonbury three years ago.



I was working in my office at home when my phone rang. It was Barton’s agent. He had heard I knew the right people to fix up a meeting for his player and Morrissey, one of the greatest poets, lyricists and singers ever, and he politely asked if I could help out.



Reformed character: Joey Barton appears to be at home with Queens Park Rangers after some difficulties

Management material? Harry Redknapp said he can see Barton becoming a boss when he retires

Two fingers up: This is what Barton would look like if he assumed a managerial role in the future

Joey had been aggressive and abusive towards me on social media but I have standards and I don’t hold grudges, so I was happy to oblige.



So I made the necessary call and a few weeks later I smiled as I read in MailOnline about Joey Barton’s meeting with Moz at Glastonbury.



Secondly, he has been doing his coaching badges and a good friend of mine (a journalist, not an ex-professional footballer), was on the same course as Barton.



Some of the other former players on the same course wanted to ‘get’ the journalist. This may have meant injuring him on the pitch, or bullying him off it; or merely playing some footballer-style pranks on him, possibly urinating in his shoes or setting fire to his clothes - the sort of high-brow jinks players get excited about.



We will never know what might’ve happened, however, because Barton took it upon himself to look after my pal, and they struck up a friendship.



They're up! QPR clinched promotion to the Premier League by beating Derby County on Saturday

I won’t pretend I know Barton personally – we are from similar backgrounds but that’s probably where the similarities end.



To be honest I’m not really interested in what he’s like off the field, I talk and write about football and that’s where I want to focus when talking about him.



Getting bogged down in some of the huge problems of his past isn’t a fair way to judge him as a professional footballer now.



I do think it is time to re-evaluate Barton on the pitch though.



Two years ago he let QPR down badly when he was sent off for fighting at Manchester City. But this season he has made up for that.



His leadership has been brilliant and his tactical discipline has been seriously impressive. Both of those qualities were evident on Saturday at Wembley as QPR beat Derby to win promotion back to the Premier League.



A source close to Harry Redknapp told me on Saturday that he has ‘grown to like Barton’ as the season has gone on. In the post-match frenzy at Wembley, Redknapp declared that Barton will make a great manager in the future.

Last year the midfielder was adamant he wouldn’t play in the Championship, but he’s knuckled down and been one of the leaders for QPR this season.



I was at the game at Wembley with Stuart Pearce, who worked with Barton at Manchester City. Pearce told me: ‘Joey is reasonably likeable. I don’t think he’s been blessed with a great deal of talent and if you’d told me back then when he was in Man City’s reserves he would have a career in professional football at this level I would have said, “Not a chance in hell.”



'He’s got where he’s got in the professional game purely through doggedness and hard work and wanting to be out on the training pitch. I probably see a little bit of me in him in regards to that.’



That’s high praise from Pearce, who played in a World Cup semi final and a European Championship semi-final.



At QPR Barton is doing what he did at Newcastle: looking at home towards the top of the Championship.

Off the field Barton is at times smart, at other times ridiculous and that’s why I’d rather judge him on his football, although in the past some of the things he has done away from the game have been impossible to ignore.

Fighter: Barton has looked at home at the top of the Championship throughout this season

I suspect his appearance on Question Time this week will see him try to win applause from the audience with carefully thought out words about UKIP, criticism of politicians (always a winner from the non-politicians on the QT panel) and a blast at the FA when he’s asked about England’s chances at the World Cup.



Throw in a few big words, present the family man image, mention that he’s doing a degree and maybe a quote from Nietzsche and he’ll become the poster boy for reformed violent criminals, and that’s not a bad thing.



He’s gone from being a thug, to being aggressive on social media, to seeking to expand his mind. He’s heading in a positive direction. If he survives Piers Morgan on TV on Thursday night, Barton’s off-the-field reinvention will, in the eyes of the public, probably be complete.

