Football League World
·25 décembre 2024
Football League World
·25 décembre 2024
A former Liverpool and Charlton Athletic midfielder now plays his football abroad.
Former Liverpool and Charlton Athletic midfielder Jonjo Shelvey now plays his football in another country.
Shelvey was an academy graduate at The Valley, and made his professional debut for Charlton against Barnsley in the Championship during the 2007/08 season.
That appearance made him the youngest ever player to represent the Addicks, with the midfielder being just 16 years and 59 days old when he was trusted to play for the first team by Alan Pardew.
He made 49 appearances in total for Charlton, scoring eight goals and providing seven assists, and is still the youngest player ever to score for the club after he netted his first senior goal against Norwich City when he was still only 16.
His performances in SE7 attracted interest from the Premier League, and he signed for Liverpool in a deal that may have risen to £3 million in 2010.
Shelvey spent three seasons on Merseyside before joining fellow Premier League side Swansea City for an initial fee of £5 million in the summer of 2013.
The 32-year-old made 278 appearances in the top flight of English football for Liverpool, Swansea, Newcastle United and Nottingham Forest, before he made the decision to embark on a new adventure abroad in 2023.
After not being given a squad number at Forest ahead of the 2023/24 campaign, Shelvey signed for Turkish Süper Lig club Caykur Rizespor during the summer transfer window in 2023, in what was the first move away from England in his career.
He made nine goal contributions from midfield, and even captained the side on a couple of occasions, as Rizespor finished ninth in the Turkish Süper Lig during the 2023/24 season, which earned him another move earlier this year.
Shelvey joined newly-promoted Turkish Süper Lig side Eyupspor, who are managed by former Barcelona midfielder Arda Turan, in August.
Eyupspor are in the top flight of Turkish football for the first time in their history, having won the title in the second tier last term, and they are performing well this season, with a 2-2 draw away at Galatasaray standing out as one of the highlights of their campaign so far.
Having broken records as a teenager at Charlton, represented one of the biggest clubs in England at Liverpool, and finished top of the Championship with Newcastle during his career, Shelvey will likely be fairly satisfied once his playing days come to an end.
He is renowned for his technical ability, with an impressive range of passing the highlight of his game, while he is also effective at shielding the defence, breaking up the play, and also contributing in the final third when the opportunity presents itself.
The midfielder may look back on the FA Cup final in 2012, which saw Liverpool suffer defeat against Chelsea, and wish that he could have played a part in such a prestigious fixture, but other than that, he is sure to be happy with an impressive career that he will no doubt be proud of.
With Shelvey having been a regular feature in the Premier League for more than a decade, it may come as a surprise that he now plays for a club that is playing in the Turkish top flight for the first time ever, but he will hope that Eyupspor can build on their good start to the season so he can add another achievement to his career.