Barnet's Fairclough under fire.

Barnet Manager, Paul Fairclough, is being criticised in some quarters for abusing his position as coach to the England Non-League XI (Now England C) team following the Barnet signing of York midfielder Neal Bishop. Bishop played for Fairclough’s England set-up in the recent Four Nations Tournament in Scotland and has now joined Barnet under a Bosman move. York fans are up in arms as this follows their loss of Andy Bishop to Bury and Clayton Donaldson to Scottish side Hibs in similar circumstances.

There are suggestions in Non-League circles that the position of England C coach should be “neutral” but this, of course, would also rule out all the Conference managers leaving very few qualified candidates for the job. The fact is, Fairclough has been in charge of the National Game XI since January 2003 and this appears to be the first time one of his selections has moved to join him at Barnet.

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