West Ham almost signed Jonjo Shelvey from Newcastle United in the summer transfer window, according to the Guardian.
Shelvey, 27, has confirmed that he was on the verge of leaving St James’ Park with the newspaper claiming that West Ham was supposed to be the destination the midfielder was heading to.
The former Liverpool midfielder also says that Newcastle put a stop to the move that would have seen him end his three-year association with the North-East club.
“I was close to leaving but the club said ‘no’,” said Shelvey, as quoted by the Guardian.
He added: “I’m happy here, I love living in this city. I’ve never once stated I wanted to leave.”
Bruce role key?
Shelvey dropped out of favour under Rafa Benitez last season as he started just 10 Premier League matches.
While the 27-year-old had suffered from several different injury issues over the course of the campaign, even when he was back to fitness he struggled to move above Sean Longstaff, Isaac Hayden, Mohamed Diame and Ki Sung-yueng in the pecking order.
It seems like Shelvey’s future at St James’ Park hinged on whether or not Benitez stayed.
Of course, Benitez eventually left at the end of his contract and was replaced by Steve Bruce in the Newcastle hotseat.
Was Shelvey on the verge of a move to West Ham before Bruce came in and pulled the plug on a potential deal? It seems likely.
Since the start of the new season, Shelvey has started three out of four matches in all competitions and was even picked over Longstaff for the 3-1 defeat at Norwich, in which he scored.
Although he was back on the bench at Tottenham last weekend, Bruce does seem to be putting more faith in the £70,000-a-week [Spotrac] midfielder than Benitez did, and that could have been vital to keeping him.
Was keeping Shelvey worthwhile?
Shelvey had a night to forget on Wednesday when he missed his spot-kick in the penalty shoot-out defeat to Leicester in the Carabao Cup.
Sky Sports pundit Sue Smith, speaking on Sky Sports News on Wednesday [09:48pm], claimed the midfielder was “a little bit lazy” in that match, which does not bode well to his chances of returning to Bruce’s starting line-up in the Premier League against Watford this weekend.
According to stats by WhoScored, Shelvey has completed 80.8 percent of his passes in the league this season, which is better than Longstaff and Hayden have managed and only Joelinton and Miguel Almiron have averaged more shots at goal.
Shelvey has done better than expected in the Premier League, but it does look as though Newcastle are a better team without him due to the fact that their only win has come when he hasn’t featured.