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John Barnes caused shock when he picked up and talked about The S*n on Channel 5’s The Wright Stuff.

The ex-Liverpool star , who is revered on Merseyside, was appearing as part of a panel of newspaper reviewers and talked about the publication which caused outrage with its front page lies about fans’ behaviour during the disaster.

LFC fan John Stansfield, who was watching the show, told the ECHO: “I just couldn’t believe it. I am absolutely gutted. John Barnes is a hero of mine but he chose to pick up that paper and go through it panel by panel.”

Speaking to the ECHO, Barnes, who has been on the panel all week, explained he was reviewing all the newspapers of the day and was not endorsing one paper in particular.

He also promised to tell the show’s researchers not to ask him to review The S*n in future.

Mr Barnes said: “The fact that I am speaking about it [The S*n] does not mean I am endorsing it. I was reviewing all newspapers and one of them was the S*n. We review all the newspapers that day but it’s not about the paper.

“We get there at 8am and there are newspapers you have to review. We don’t get a choice. The stories are written at 5am. We are given a bunch of papers and given a topic. We don’t choose any stories at all. This has been going on for years and I am sure the show will verify that.”

Mr Stansfield, 53, is a lifelong Liverpool fan who was at the ground on April 15 1989 when the disaster unfolded, leaving 96 people dead.

Mr Stansfield, who lives in Accrington but is originally from Bootle , said: “Matthew Wright says: ‘Right, John what quotes do you want to take?’ And he says ‘I want to take one from the S*n’.

“I was watching it, saying ‘what are you doing?’ It’s live TV and he was physically holding that newspaper in hand and a caption comes up at the bottom and I was so sick I couldn’t even listen to what he was saying.

“Unless I have got the format wrong he has had a choice but he made a decision to quote from that rag and say it on TV. That is what has hurt me the most.”

His concern was echoed by fans on Twitter. Paul Petrie said: “John Barnes reading The Sun on your show DISGRACE” and Gill Morrey said: “Why did you read an article from the SCUM on live tv?”

Mr Stansfield said: “I cannot understand it. He was on the pitch that day for God’s sake. It changed everyone’s lives forever. I know we have had closure since but I cannot get my head around it.

“I am someone who absolutely loved him as a footballer. I have a picture of Johnny Barnes holding my son when he was three. He’s 25 now. His middle name is Shankly.

“I feel let down. I feel massively let down. He is somebody who was on the pitch that and day still lives in the area, he knows the depth of feeling there is from both footballing tribes in this city. If he lived in London he might say he doesn’t know how bad it is but Jonny Barnes was on the pitch that day and he lives in Wirral . He knows the depth of feeling. I loved that man.

“It’s way worse than what Mark Lawrenson did.”

Mark Lawrenson, a former Liverpool defender who played alongside Barnes but left the club before Hillsborough, came in for heavy criticism after posing with a copy of the S*n on Match of the Day’s twitter account in February, although he later said he did not realise which paper he was holding.

Addressing the perception that he “chose” the specific story and the paper to review, John Barnes said: “That’s the terminology they use. None of us choose a story. If I was to choose a story I would have to go through all the stories. I don’t have time to trawl through story after story. I can guarantee 100% I didn’t choose the story. The researchers choose those stories.”

He added: “What I will try and do tomorrow is ask them not to give me any stories from the S*n. I didn’t think reviewing a paper would be seen as a story. It’s crazy. I don’t like the Express or the Mail very much either but I still review them.

“How it works is there’s a pile of papers and a piece of white paper on top that just says the name of paper and the story. That’s what you are reviewing. I never really thought about it. The S*n aren’t paying me do anything.

“I was on on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and maybe I could have mentioned the S*n then too. I don’t know. Tommorrow I shall make a point that I won’t do anything from the S*n.”