John Barnes has reacted to the racial abuse of England players during their defeat of Montenegro earlier this week.

The Liverpool legend watched on as England overcame the European minnows 5-1.

Danny Rose and Raheem Sterling were the subject of racist taunts in Podgorica, sparking condemnation from the British press.

Gareth Southgate, the Three Lions's manager and ex-Aston Villa star, reacted furiously.

Rose was subjected to monkey chants in Podgorica while Sterling reacted to scoring England's fifth goal by facing the Montenegro fans and cupping his ears.

John Barnes on Sky News
John Barnes on Sky News

But, highlighting hypocrisy today, Barnes told Sky: "Up and down the country every single week at football matches you have black football players being racially abused so why is this any different?

"I think that it is quite hypocritical that we want to talk about Montenegro and say how terrible it is when we have not taken care of the problem here.

"We go to Montenegro once every six months, whereby every week we face it here in droves. So what is more serious? Going to Montenegro once a year or black people facing this every single day of their lives?

"Because it is high profile, we say, 'let's do something about it', but we are really not tackling the issue here.

"Overt racism probably has gone out of the game, but in the last six months you can see what's happening even here in this country.

 "If you're talking about making teams play behind closed doors - you've got the high-profile situation of Raheem Sterling at Manchester City - but you go to the League One, League Two and non-league games and you'll hear racist abuse as fans have said.

"But is there a drive to close all of those stadiums or get those teams banned? There is not. Once we then look at Montenegro and these other eastern European countries and say how terrible it is out there, it absolves us of responsibility for what's happening here.

"Instead of passing laws why don't we try and educate people why they feel the need to be racially abusing people and then we can actually deconstruct the whole idea of why they feel that way rather than just banning and passing laws.  

"So laws, yes, I understand the reason why people feel we have to do this, but how many years have we been doing this and nothing has changed. If it has not worked, let's try a different approach."