As one of the few high-quality players trained by the Guoan youth training, Barton was born because of the league U23 policy introduced by the Football Association in the 2017 season. This season, Guoan's then-coach Xie Feng was wise and discerning, and promoted Barton from the Guoan echelon to the Guoan first team, replacing Tang Shi, a young player who had not performed well in the league.
Barton, who entered the Guoan team, soon got the opportunity to start in the Chinese Super League, as a winger, Barton can not only use his running ability to cover the entire right side of Guoan, but also his constant attack can often bring a lot of threat to the opponent's backline.
In the 20th round of the league, Barton scored the first Goal of his career in the Chinese Super League when he faced his hometown team Shandong Luneng at home, and this goal also reminded Beijing fans of the 22-year-old Guoan youngster.
However, just 2 seasons later, Barton entered the trough of his career. Losing the protection of the U23 policy, Barton has had few appearances since the start of the 2019 season. In the past two seasons, Barton has played only 12 games for Guoan, averaging less than 25 minutes per game.
In order to change this embarrassing situation, Barton chose to join the comeback Tianjin Jinmen Tigers on loan this season. And this key choice also ushered in a turning point in his career.
After joining Tianjin, Barton was quickly reused by coach Yu Genwei, and in the first stage of the Chinese Super League, in addition to missing 2 league games between Tianjin and Guoan due to avoidance clauses, Barton participated in all the remaining matches and scored 1 goal and 1 assist.
Because of his outstanding performance in the league, Barton was also called into the national team by then coach Li Tie. Although as a newcomer to the national team, Barton has not been able to get a chance to play in the round of 12 of the national football team. But he was not discouraged at all, and with his positive attitude in training, he won the opportunity to continue to stay in the national football team.
In the second match between the national football team and Australia, Barton finally ushered in his national team debut. In the 80th minute of the second half, Barton put on the team, he not only completed the task given to him by Li Tie well, but also scored a goal from the opponent, but unfortunately this goal was invalidated because of the handball blown first.
After two World Cup games in November, Barton returned to Tianjin. In the second stage of the league, Barton played all 8 games for the Zinmen Tigers and again contributed 1 goal and 1 assist to the team.
As this season's Chinese Super League enters the final stages, Barton's contract with Guoan is also about to expire at the end of the year. At present, Guoan is actively seeking to renew his contract with Barton.
However, Barton today has a higher pursuit than he did a year ago. Recently, in an interview with a well-known domestic football media, Barton publicly stated that he wanted to stay in Europe like teammate Li Lei to stimulate more potential for himself.
As we all know, today's Chinese Super League has entered a cold winter period, and the level of the league and the income of players have dropped significantly. In such a situation, some strong players began to seek to develop in the Europa League.
Although the income of playing in Europe is much lower than that of the Chinese Super League, they can further improve their abilities by training and playing in high-level clubs. This will not only help these players realize their dreams of staying abroad, but also effectively improve their personal and technical and tactical capabilities, laying a more solid foundation for their future return to the Chinese Super League.
So, we also wish Barton the best of his ability to play in higher overseas leagues next year. And hope that in the future, after he returns to the Chinese Super League, he can continue to contribute to Beijing football.