Gareth Barry wants to help turn Manchester City from a mid-table club into title contenders.Despite rumours that Rafa Benitez may still have been interested in the England midfielder, Barry completed a £12 million move from Aston Villa to Eastlands earlier this month.Let’s take Barry’s situation first. I have dealt with him on a professional basis for some time and he has always been helpful in dealing with his media commitments. He is polite, affable and fairly straight-forward.

However, I cannot believe that he has handled this whole affair so badly. This particular story began to unravel in April 2008, before the derby against Birmingham City, when he was put up in front of assembled hacks with his future high on the agenda.

I have it from a top source that this was deliberate. Villa boss Martin O’Neill wanted to hear for himself just what was going through Barry’s mind. It would have been easy to pull the midfielder out of his interviews. Clubs do it all the time if there are tricky situations they want to avoid.

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