As Jonjo Shelvey reacclimatised to life in the England set-up, the player who could feasibly be entrusted with the midfield role left by Steven Gerrard thought back to some of his “immature mistakes” and one in particular when he was sent off playing for Liverpool against Manchester United and left the pitch jabbing his finger at Sir Alex Ferguson. The incident, he remembered, earned him “a few high fives around town” but there was a trace of regret in his voice. Older, wiser, Shelvey is determined to show he has grown up in a football sense.
There were other controversies earlier in his career – Shelvey had been red-carded for a studs-high challenge on Jonny Evans in that game – and the player can say from first-hand experience that, in football, getting a bad name is easier sometimes than losing one.
A year ago, Roy Hodgson said Shelvey had let it be known he was “reticent” about playing for England Under-21s once he had made his senior debut in October 2012. The fallout from that comment has hung over Shelvey ever since and it is only now that the Swansea City player has sought to set the record straight.
“I can assure you that I have never refused to play for England in my whole life and that if I did my dad would kill me,” Shelvey says. “Where I come from, every boy grows up wanting to play for England. I would never turn my back on my country and I get a bit upset when it keeps getting mentioned. I saw Stuart Pearce saying something about it on television the other day. I was watching in bed and I was a bit upset because that isn’t me and I can assure you, on my daughter’s life, that I have never refused to play for my country.
“I remember what the mix-up was. When Gareth Southgate took over he made a phone call to me and said: ‘By the time the Euros come around I don’t expect you to be with the Under-21s, I expect you to be with the seniors.’ That is where it got mixed up, I think, but then I got off the phone and sent a text to Gareth Southgate saying if I am not [in the seniors] then I am available to play and I would never turn my back on my country. So I hope that clears it up. I just wouldn’t do that. Honestly, if I had any hair I think my dad would literally have pulled it out.”
Point made, Shelvey is willing to admit that some of the criticism of him in the past has been warranted. Garry Monk went public at one point with his own complaints at Swansea City and that tactic, Shelvey now accepts, looks to have been a smart one. “He came out in the press and said that I was lazy and things like that. I wasn’t so much angry, more surprised. I felt that, if anything, he could have spoken to me [in private] but we have spoken about it on numerous occasions now and it’s all fine.
“After that, it could either go one way or the other. You either sit around and sulk on the bench or you get the bit between your teeth and really kick on and listen to what he has got to say. I did that and that is paying off now.”
Shelvey credits the improvement to Monk – the manager he believes could eventually succeed Hodgson – and the club’s psychiatrist, Ian Mitchell, both of whom have been working with the 23-year-old to curb his aggression and take a more leading role. “I can understand why people don’t like me,” Shelvey says. “I’m a bit like Marmite, you either love me or hate me. But if you get to know me you’ll realise I just want to win on the pitch.
“If you met me off the pitch you’d find I’m totally different. But even on the pitch I’ve changed my ways. I don’t have as many rows on the pitch as I did before. There’s no need to row on the football pitch. I was a bit immature before, but you can’t keeping having rows.
“It was happening with me too often – during games, you get into tackles, you get up and swear at someone, he’ll swear at you and then you square up. It’s part and parcel of football, I suppose, but the more you can limit that, the better you look.
“That time [with Ferguson], I was a bit silly. I pulled him aside afterwards to apologise and he was spot on with me. He said: ‘No, I like it, it shows you’ve got a bit of balls about you’ – but it was silly to do that. I got a few high fives around town but it was silly from me on the professional stage.
“You don’t do something like that. The occasion got the better of me. It was part of growing up and you have to learn from those sort of things.”
