When Portsmouth sacked Tony Adams yesterday after less than four months in the job he joined two other former international captains - Roy Keane and Paul Ince - in leaving a Premier League club during the course of the season.

Luiz Felipe Scolari, a proven international manager, yesterday joined them in losing his job when he was sacked by Chelsea.

And with Middlesbrough boss Gareth Southgate, another ex-England international, also facing questions over his future, Barnes fears a lack of patience at boardroom level could be forcing some experienced and talented men out of the game.

Barnes is back in management with his native Jamaica, who face Nigeria at the New Den tomorrow night, but his first taste of management, at Celtic, was also cut short.

And he feels it is a worrying trend.

"Never mind about Premier League level, I think football generally is in danger of losing good people," Barnes told PA Sport.

"I believe you will have a generation of managers - potentially great managers - lost to the sport.

"These are people with great potential who do not get the right opportunities.

"Support should be given to coaches of all ages but unfortunately it isn't.

"Instead you have people making decisions who know nothing about football and they think the easiest thing in the world is just to sack the manager.

"But players have to start taking accountability. I had a situation at Celtic where, sub-consciously players knew it was the manager who would take the criticism if they under-performed."

Barnes also believes that Chelsea's decision to part ways with a manager of Scolari's pedigree after less than a season at the helm was misguided.

Scolari, a World Cup-winning coach with Brazil who also earned praise for his work with Portugal, was dismissed yesterday after the Blues hit a poor run of form.

There have been suggestions that Scolari's methods failed to win over key players in the Stamford Bridge set-up but Barnes believes the worrying influence of player power - it has been reported that Portsmouth owner Alexandre Gaydamak also canvassed the squad before dispensing with Adams - is a toxic influence.

"It typifies what modern football is when you have a World Cup winner (Scolari) treated like that," said Barnes.

"That someone like him can be fired after so few games shows football is in a sad state.

"The problem is that you have directors and people above the manager that the players should not be talking to. They should not be speaking to them about tactics or about coaches but unfortunately that is the way things are going.

"Directors and such people will always favour players because they get the glory. Players have their ear and that is a sad situation."