When Jonjo Shelvey was coming up through the ranks at Charlton Athletic, he was touted as a potential England regular.
A move to Liverpool as an 18-year-old would follow in 2010, with a full England debut arriving two years later, but he would fail to establish himself as a regular in the Three Lions midfield at that time.
Shelvey was knocking on the door again during his time at Newcastle United, going on to play some of the best football of his career during the 2017/18 season, but a call-up for that summer’s World Cup never came.
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Shelvey on his England career
Shelvey would end up winning just six Three Lions caps, with his 2018 World Cup omission particularly galling for him as he looks back at his international career.
“Yes, 100 per cent I should have won more caps,” he told FourFourTwo. “Sometimes I didn’t deserve them, but other times I did and was overlooked.”
After helping guide Newcastle to promotion from the Championship in 2016/17, he enjoyed a fruitful first season back in the top flight, but believes his absence from the Three Lions squad that went to Russia that summer stemmed from an incident during his time in the under-21s.
“I should have been taken to the 2018 World Cup, because that season I had the most assists of any English midfielder when I was at Newcastle,” he continues.
“I was playing the best football of my career but didn’t get a call-up. I think it all stemmed from something that happened with Gareth Southgate a few years earlier. When he got the under 21 job, I’d already played for the seniors, but I was still eligible for them.
“I’d just joined Swansea when Southgate gave me a call and said: ‘I’m not going to bring you because you’ve just moved clubs and you’ve got the Europa League qualifiers, so I’m going to look at some other players, and I also expect you to be with the senior team.’
“I was fine with that, but told him if anything changed I’d be there for him, because I loved playing for England.”
Shelvey believes the mixed messages that followed impacted his international future.
“Then I think he said I’d refused to play,” he continues. “When Roy Hodgson called me up to the senior squad, I remember Stuart Pearce saying on Sky Sports News that I shouldn’t have been selected as I’d refused to play for the under 21s.
“When I was at St George’s Park, I went to find Southgate and asked him why he’d said that, because I’d said I would come. He just said: ‘No, no, I didn’t say that.’ I knew from that moment I wasn’t going to play for him.”
