Shelvey claims Southgate rift cost him 2018 World Cup place despite leading England's midfielders in assists

Jonjo Shelvey has claimed that a falling-out with Gareth Southgate during the latter’s time as England under-21 manager directly cost him a place in the 2018 World Cup squad, despite the Newcastle United midfielder finishing that season with more assists than any other English midfielder in the Premier League.

Speaking to FourFourTwo, Shelvey — who won just six senior England caps across his career — said the trouble began when Southgate, having just taken charge of the under-21s, called to say he would not be selecting him for an upcoming camp. Shelvey had already played for the senior side and had just joined Swansea City, and Southgate cited the Europa League qualifiers and a desire to look at other players as reasons for the omission.

“I was fine with that, but told him if anything changed I’d be there for him, because I loved playing for England,” Shelvey said.

What followed, according to Shelvey, was a damaging misrepresentation of that conversation. “Then I think he said I’d refused to play,” he continued. “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.”

Shelvey says he confronted Southgate about the claim during a senior squad gathering 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.”

By the time Southgate was appointed senior England manager in 2016, Shelvey was in arguably the best form of his career. He helped Newcastle win promotion from the Championship in 2016/17 and carried that momentum into the following Premier League season, yet received no call-up ahead of the Russia tournament.

“I should have been taken to the 2018 World Cup, because that season I had the most assists of any English midfielder,” he said. “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.”

Shelvey is candid about the limits of his international career overall. “Yes, 100 per cent I should have won more caps,” he acknowledged. “Sometimes I didn’t deserve them, but other times I did and was overlooked.” The midfielder, who began his career at Charlton Athletic before joining Liverpool as an 18-year-old in 2010, made his senior England debut two years later but never cemented a regular place in the squad.