The Big Interview: Seb Hines and Giles Barnes

The former Premier League duo are reinventing Orlando Pride. After a season of progress in 2023, they have big plans for 2024, and as well as their aims discuss their own personal journeys...

Feb 13, 2024

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Seb Hines [Left] and Giles Barnes [Right] are at the helm of NWSL side Orlando Pride. Image: Orlando Pride

As teenagers, Seb Hines and Giles Barnes share taxis to and from England camps. In the youth teams, they were roommates, close friends, but across time became rivals as their top-level careers in the Premier League took off for Middlesbrough and Derby County respectively.

Over 20 years later, they have been reunited at the other side of the world, with Hines now permanent head coach of NWSL side Orlando Pride, where he soon called upon his old mate Barnes to come and join him, after both had coincidentally left home behind and played for MLS side Orlando City, as their careers converged again over a decade on.

“I’ve known Giles since I was 13,” reflects Hines, who is now preparing his Pride side for the 2024 season. “He was at Derby and I was at Middlesbrough, we played against each other a lot at academy level.

“We see the game the same way, so that transition to working together was very easy. I’ve been here longer and knew the history and the steps we needed to take to move forward. It’s been nothing out of the ordinary, can we be fitter, do the basics, there’s no entitlement for any player to play, they have to earn the right now.”

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Barnes, who was labelled as something of a wonder-kid when he broke into the Derby side at just 17, helping them to promotion to the Premier League, had his blossoming career hampered early on by a long-standing knee injury, and is now channelling that into coaching with his close friend.

“We go way back,” says the former Jamaica international. “We played together from 13, now we’re both 35, so it’s been a long time. We played for Orlando together, we’ve shared a journey, we know how each other thinks, we were brought up in the same culture.

“It makes things easier when it’s your friend, to have those open conversations, those growth moments. We grow together and we learn from each other. When you’ve known each other so long, there’s already trust there. It’s where great relationships start, we can look at each other and know we trust each other implicitly, that’s a great foundation.”

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