'We don't want you here' - What Joey Barton told Alan Pardew on his first day at Newcastle United

Former Newcastle United boss Alan Pardew has opened up about his time at the club and how Joey Barton reacted to his appointment

Joey Barton told Alan Pardew that the players did not want him on his first day as Newcastle United manager.

Pardew succeeded the popular Chris Hughton as the Magpies' boss back in December, 2010 and was handed a five-and-a-half year contract.

Before taking charge at St James' Park, Pardew had previously spent 13 months at Southampton, then in League One, and his appointment did not go down well with fans.

Speaking on the 'A Pint with Eamonn and the Gaffers' podcast, Pardew has opened up about being perceived as Mike Ashley's 'pal' following his appointment - even though he was adamant that was not the case.

"I was from London as well which probably didn't go in my favour because I think they had a thing about London with Dennis Wise and Mike and everyone else," he said in conversation with Eamonn Holmes. "I was coming in on a negative, even a double negative, because the first day I was there, the door goes and Joey Barton's at the door.

"Joey Barton comes in and, typical Joey, no fillip, no familiarity with Joey or no kind of nonsense of, 'Hello. How are you?' No formalities whatsoever. 'Just to let you know, me and the players don't want you here. We don't think you should be here and you need to know it.' I think that was his opening line. I was like, 'OK' but I liked that.

"At least with Joey, you knew where you stood so that was my start at Newcastle and I knew, with people like Kevin Nolan, Joey Barton, big characters like that, you have got to win respect and the only way you're going to win it is on the training ground and with results.

"All this happy camp of a football club and the great spirit....They talk about Liverpool - well they win every week so the spirit is going to be pretty high. You need to win games and we managed to win games and I loved it at Newcastle.

"The fans were amazing. They didn't think I was amazing - they were just coping with me - and we had some massive success there for the budget we had. The year we finished 5th, I think we were the bottom club in terms of net spend so we were really overachieving and I had a great group of players and, like all managers, you live and die by your players and I had a great leadership group: Kevin Nolan, Shola Ameobi.

"Staunch players who knew what was needed to win games. The atmosphere and the electricity of that stadium never left me. Some of the nights and days we had there were amazing. Beating your mob, Man United, 3-0. It was brilliant."

Barton was among those Newcastle players who were upset with the manner of Hughton's sacking but the former midfielder went on to describe Pardew as one of the 'better managers' he played under.

On that first day, when he told him the players did not want him, Pardew responded by telling Barton what he would demand of himself as a manager and of the midfielder as a player. So what was the pair's relationship like?

"There are times with Joey - as  you've seen in games - where he loses the plot," Pardew added. "I mean Joey can lose the plot over a dog having a wee wee up a tree - he can literally lose the plot. It doesn't take a lot. 

"Numerous times I took him off the training ground and made him stand with me and you've got to be strong. 'What are you taking me off the pitch for?' 'Come and stand here'. And Joey would stand there for five minutes going mad.

"I thought he was going to attack me from the back or whatever but he didn't. He calmed down and I put him back on the training ground so those type of characters you've got to be strong with and other characters you've got to be very, very soft with because of their self-confidence.

"With Joey's self-confidence, if you actually asked him on a lie detector where do you put yourself in the top 10 players of all-time, he would probably put himself about sixth but he would believe it.

"You wouldn't get that on the dial - he would actually believe it - so that's great. That's super self-confidence. Some players are the complete opposite. 'How good do you think you are?' 'Oh, I'm not sure I can play in this team. I'm not sure I should be at this level'.

"You have got to kind of coax it out of them and get belief in them. It is judging characters like everything when you're managing in life. Whether you're running the local supermarket or whatever, you've got to understand what's the criteria of the person? What's their make-up? What's going to hit them? What's going to touch their buttons so to speak?"