Jonjo Shelvey (now playing for Çaykur Rizespor, on loan from Nottingham Forest)

[Consortium of one]

Really for me is how he absolutely let himself, team, manager, and all of us down in our return to the PL at home on the big stage. Just shockingly stupid after being in great shape and having a fantastic preseason. Still seething at this as I'm convinced we'd have battled for at least a point.

 

Exactly, he really let the team down.  I think he's important to the way we play and he should go straight into the side when he gets back but he shouldn't wear the armband until he proves he has worked past these issues.  Dele was cuntish and either he was going to get a red or someone else was and Shelvey capitulated and let Dele off the hook.

 

Not just that play.  He was being mouthy all game, especially with Lascelles earlier.

 

I don't really see what Alli did that was so bad, he tapped the ball away to stop Shelvey picking it up quickly. If that's Shelvey's response after having psychological treatment you have to wonder when it's ever going to change.

[Minhosa]

Apparently being seeing a pyschologist since the Forest game last season to tame the red mist.

 

Obviously working well for the idiot.

 

I suspect the "red mist" is an incurable problem for some players, some of the legends. How many times was Zidane sent off? See also Roy Keane, Gerrard, etc.

 

The problem with Shelvey is that he is unproven as a "the red mist is worth it" player in the Premiership. He was easily better than so many Championship midfielders that his disciplinary problems weren't a problem in that league. He was offering enough in the games he did play. He's now playing at a much higher standard though, and either has to perform at a level that still makes him worth it or cut it out so it is not an issue.

 

He's yet to have more than five good games for us in Premiership fixtures. His debut at home to West Ham was his only stand out game from memory.

 

Said it during pre-season but I'm surprised Rafa has stuck with him tbqh, even before this incident. He'd have been for sale for me and I said that back in June/July.

[Dokko]

Good words from Elliot, I wonder if Rafa sees him more of a leader than his other options?

[joeyt]

Yeah, Magpie! Even though you didn't say that Shelvey's the Alli of our team at all, and in fact already said that Alli's a better player, I'd just like to make the completely worthless point that Shelvey's not the Dele Alli of our team.

 

 

But he's our Eric Cantona!

[astraguy]

Shelvey was 100% wrong in how he acted but i have 0% doubts ali was having sly digs in his ear to wind him up

[Guest Bordertoon]

Regarding Shelvey seeing a psych, although it might sound a little silly, it certainly wouldn't take a Freudian long to formulate his problem, with the following 2 key concepts (lifted from Wikipedia) pretty much summing Shelvey up for mine:

 

ACTING OUT - "Acting out is a psychological term from the parlance of defense mechanisms and self-control, meaning to perform an action in contrast to bearing and managing the impulse to perform it." (In other words, no doubt many of us would feel drawn to stamping on Dele Alli, but most of us would resist the urge to do so in Shelvey's position on Sunday).

 

REPETITION COMPULSION - "Repetition compulsion is a psychological phenomenon in which a person repeats a traumatic event or its circumstances over and over again. This includes reenacting the event or putting oneself in situations where the event is likely to happen again." (So, unconsciously, Shelvey can't help but create situations like the one on Sunday, and then has very little self-control to manage those situations well. Although I have my doubts that Dele Alli is well schooled in Freudian theory, I suspect that his rat cunning - or perhaps Pochettino's pre-match instructions - basically gave him the same insight. If you look at the incident closely, you can see Alli turn his head and think "oh, it's you, I'll kick the ball away and see what happens", and Shelvey then immediately fell into the trap, while hoping that his ridiculous acting would make it seem like an innocent accident).

 

Unfortunately, unless the psych can help Shelvey to conquer the two things above, then he's always going to be prone to the sort of disaster that we saw on Sunday (just like Joey Barton was before him - Liverpool away during our relegation battle under Shearer springs to mind). To make matters worse, not only can such incidents occur in key moments or matches, but they are actually more likely to occur at those times, because the player is more emotionally charged than usual, so heaven help us if Shelvey ever takes to the pitch for us in a cup final (actually, I have my doubts about Mitro too, but with him there's at least a chance - albeit a slim one - that he will grow out of the tendency as he gets older).

 

 

[samptime29]

Really pissed me off yesterday. Stupid red.

 

We need him though. I hope he can calm down and have a productive season.

 

He just needs to walk away. Ali is a little snide.

[Altamullan]

Regarding Shelvey seeing a psych, although it might sound a little silly, it certainly wouldn't take a Freudian long to formulate his problem, with the following 2 key concepts (lifted from Wikipedia) pretty much summing Shelvey up for mine:

 

ACTING OUT - "Acting out is a psychological term from the parlance of defense mechanisms and self-control, meaning to perform an action in contrast to bearing and managing the impulse to perform it." (In other words, no doubt many of us would feel drawn to stamping on Dele Alli, but most of us would resist the urge to do so in Shelvey's position on Sunday).

 

REPETITION COMPULSION - "Repetition compulsion is a psychological phenomenon in which a person repeats a traumatic event or its circumstances over and over again. This includes reenacting the event or putting oneself in situations where the event is likely to happen again." (So, unconsciously, Shelvey can't help but create situations like the one on Sunday, and then has very little self-control to manage those situations well. Although I have my doubts that Dele Alli is well schooled in Freudian theory, I suspect that his rat cunning - or perhaps Pochettino's pre-match instructions - basically gave him the same insight. If you look at the incident closely, you can see Alli turn his head and think "oh, it's you, I'll kick the ball away and see what happens", and Shelvey then immediately fell into the trap, while hoping that his ridiculous acting would make it seem like an innocent accident).

 

Unfortunately, unless the psych can help Shelvey to conquer the two things above, then he's always going to be prone to the sort of disaster that we saw on Sunday (just like Joey Barton was before him - Liverpool away during our relegation battle under Shearer springs to mind). To make matters worse, not only can such incidents occur in key moments or matches, but they are actually more likely to occur at those times, because the player is more emotionally charged than usual, so heaven help us if Shelvey ever takes to the pitch for us in a cup final (actually, I have my doubts about Mitro too, but with him there's at least a chance - albeit a slim one - that he will grow out of the tendency as he gets older).

Kin hell! Sigmund Fraud... Wheeling him out is equivalent in footy terms to considering how the laces in the leather balls influence spin in free kicks.

[HaydnNUFC]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-4790180/Jonjo-Shelvey-called-bald-racist-c-t.html#ixzz4pliIYIWw

 

Jonjo Shelvey lifts the lid on being called a 'bald racist c**t' on the pitch, spotting a bullet hole in the local pub TV and why 'it's the ban that kills you'

Jonjo Shelvey spoke to Sportsmail before his red card against Tottenham

Newcastle stand-in captain was sent off for a stamp on Dele Alli at St James' Park

He says he can take the fines and abuse... but hates missing matches

The midfielder is seeing a psychologist to deal with his anger issues

 

It was not at St James' Park, Newcastle, on Sunday that Jonjo Shelvey realised he had a problem. That reality dawned eight months earlier in the away dressing room at Nottingham Forest's City Ground. Sent off for kicking out at an opponent on the floor, Shelvey took his mobile phone out before he had even taken his boots off.

 

'I text my agent saying I needed to sort this out,' Shelvey told Sportsmail. 'I said: "I need to see someone who can help me, a psychologist".

'The game was still going on but I knew I had to act. The lad had given me a dig and he only did it because I was running the game.

'But I just kicked out at him and it was childish.'

 

That red card in Nottingham was actually rescinded. The one Shelvey received for treading on Dele Alli's ankle this weekend will not be.

One game in to a Premier League season the 25-year-old knows will be the most important of his career and he is back to square one. One game, one defeat, one sending off.

Criticism has been quick and unstinting and the only consolation he can take is that he knows he has a problem and is trying to fix it.

 

'Look, sometimes I just need to reign in it in,' he said. 'I need to just shut up and stuff, walk away.

'But sometimes I can't help it. It's like any walk of life. If you are driving and someone cuts you up you are gonna want to start shouting.

'It's probably normal but it's something I need to nip in the bud. So after Forest I started to see a psychologist and it's been really good so far.

'But it's an ongoing process. I want to be competitive but I need to smooth some of the edges or I will be the one who suffers.

'Sometimes I can lose my head and it can't keep happening can it?'

Shelvey hates it when he can't play football. He said so when we sat down for an hour last Friday.

 

So the days will drag until he can return from a three-game ban on September 10. His dad Graham will be in his ear, too.

Shelvey's former youth coach at West Ham, Graham still texts him to tell him to get to training on time.

'He asks if I am in yet and I am like: "No dad, I am not gonna bother with training today"',' smiled Shelvey.

'But when stuff happens it's the ban that kills you. The fines you can take and what people say you can live with. But it's the bans that hurt you inside.

'Knowing that you can't help your team and that you can't play football.

'Because that's what you want to do, you want to play football, and when you can't it's shocking.'

 

Shelvey was born with alopecia, the condition which prevents his hair growing properly. As a nine-year-old, he would wear a hat at football training with Arsenal.

Other days, he used to get up early to try and brush the hair he did have over the top of the bald patches.

'I tried treatments,' he revealed.

'I rubbed an ointment in to my head but I had to sleep in a woolly hat for three months so that it could work.

'My head was sweating so much I just tore it off. So that wasn't gonna happen… then, when I was nine, I just shaved it off.

'It was unusual to see a bald nine-year-old so I would play football in hats.

'But over time I realised I had to get over it. I realised that you are what you are and if I have alopecia then so what? Deal with it. That was the attitude I took.

'With the upbringing I have, my dad and grandad would just say: "F**k it. Who cares what people think about you?"

'I think that's where I have got that streak from. That's what I have become

 

'I am not tough in terms of fighting and stuff but I think I am quite mentally strong and it all goes back to that.'

Growing up on a south London council estate, Shelvey's illness ensured he was called plenty of names and that has continued.

The most common one on the football field has been: 'You bald c**t'.

Recently, however, those insults have taken on a different tone. Last December, Shelvey was found guilty by an FA commission of racially abusing Wolves midfielder Romain Saiss during a game. The Newcastle captain maintains he didn't do it.

'I didn't say what they claimed I said but that stain will be there until I finish playing,' Shelvey admitted.

'I have to live with it. We played Leeds last season and when I went out to warm up it was: "Shelvey you racist".

'We played Wigan at home and a lad in their team came straight through me in the first minute, straight down the back of my calf.

 

'Then he has slapped me on the head as I got up and called me a "Bald racist cunt". Then he ran off.

'But you are going to get that as that is what I have been accused of doing. I am going to take it because I have to. Judgement was made.

'I am not one to be overly bothered. I know deep down who I am. If my daughter was getting something at nursery or something then that is when it will become a problem.

'But to shout stuff at me, fine. They are not gonna come on the pitch and punch me in the face are they? What can people actually do to me to hurt me? Not much.'

Shelvey's evidence at last season's hearing was deemed unreliable but his take on the matter now is categorical.

'If I had said it then I would have deserved every punishment I got, but I didn't say it,' he says.

 

'You should hear some of the things that are said on the pitch every week.

'I grew up with being called "bald this and that..." and I have been called "disabled" on the pitch.

'Some of it is just mental. And I don't just mean at my level either. I mean when I go home in the summer and have a kick about with my mates.

'Personally I am not one that goes running to the ref and says: "He has called me disabled…"

'That's the way I was brought up and a lot of it goes on reputation anyway.

'When we went to the hearing, I had a top lawyer and before the verdict the FA lawyer even said to us: "You may as well get going because you have won this."

'My lawyer tore the Wolves witnesses to pieces. Their stories didn't add up.

'And then the outcome was me being banned and a £100,000 fine.

'It is what it is. At the end of the day, they are still in the Championship and we are in the Premier League.'

 

If Shelvey sounds a little bullish then he isn't particularly. In conversation, he is more considered than you may imagine. He can be funny, too.

A very good passer of the ball, he credits that to drills set up by his father outside their house in Harold Hill near Romford. One hundred passes against the wall with his right foot and then a hundred with his left.

'I wasn't allowed to come in unless I had done them consecutively, ' he said.

'I would probably have a little cheat, though, as he left me to count. I wasn't very academically clever but even I could count to 100!

'Sometimes my homework got pushed to one side because of all that…'

Shelvey thinks football and the discipline of his parents saved him.

'It helped me not to let my life go off the rails,' he said. 'I would have gone out drinking and doing graffiti and stuff but I didn't.

'I wanted to but now, looking back, my friends all say I made the right decision.'

 

His best friend is probably his brother George, a footballer so talented that Shelvey offered to cover his wages as a plumber so that he could have a trial at his own first professional club Charlton.

'He said no because of drink,' reflected Shelvey. 'He didn't have a problem but he just loved the party lifestyle and going out.

'He is a football agent now. He has done well but he could get in most Championship teams, I am not joking.'

Shelvey still visits Harold Hill, even though he calls Newcastle 'home'. He coaches kids at the social club run by his dad but may not be back to the local pub for a while.

'I went back about two Christmas Eves ago and we went there so that dad could have a drink – I couldn't have one,' he smiled.

'It's quite rough and gets shut down every couple of weeks and then reopens by noon.

'But we walked in and I looked across at the TV and there was a bullet hole in it. I was, like, "Jesus..."

'We still stayed in there for a while but I was counting down the minutes to get out…'

 

This summer involved holidays to Las Vegas with his wife Daisy and two children and also a trip to Portugal with friends.

'I rented a car out there,' he explained. 'It was a little Citroen something or other and it was all banged up. We almost wrote it off to be honest with you.

'It makes you realise what you have at home. I have worked hard but when you get home and get back in your nice car, it makes you notice.

'I know it's only a little thing but there you go. I could have rented a nicer car but it was dear enough as it was.

'I was trying to be a bargain hunter...!'

Not all footballers love their sport but Shelvey clearly does and there is something endearing about that and indeed his candour. He does, it must be said, say some things that some sportsmen more concerned about their image maybe would not.

He admits, for example, that he searches for his career highlights on YouTube at home. He will have plenty of time over the coming weeks.

 

On his Sky box are recordings of some of his best games going all the way back to time at Charlton, then Liverpool and Swansea.

'My dad always wants to watch them,' he laughed. 'I am like: "Dad I am 25... lets go and play golf instead". But it's good. It keeps me focused and realistic.'

Watching him trudge off the pitch on Sunday, it was hard not to feel for Shelvey a little bit. It's worth noting here that it was only the third red card of a nine-year career.

Sitting with him in the north-east on Friday, it was clear above all else just what this coming season - a return to the Premier League - means to him.

'I have never had a better chance to go and do this,' he said. 'This is the best shape I am ever going to be in. Mentally I am the best I have ever been.

'I welcome the responsibility of being a key player. I want to put on a show every week. I want to be a leader.'

Now Shelvey has no choice but to place the football on hold and let the psychology take over. As he spoke about the techniques he uses, much of it focused on pre-game preparation.

 

'I have tactics that calm me down and mellow me out so I go in to the game calm and ready instead of punching the walls,' he said.

And what about when he is five minutes in and somebody kicks him from behind? What happens then?

'Then you are back to square one,' he said with a big smile.

It sounded like a joke at the time.

[Dave]

'Jonjo Shelvey spoke to Sportsmail before his red card against Tottenham'

 

The fucking timing.

 

I'd be investigating betting irregularities if I was at the FA ffs.

[prefabtoon]

We need to get rid of Shelvey a leopard never changes its spots. he is nothing but a liability and cannot be trusted to keep his cool.

Sell him now.

[Newintoon]

3 red cards in 9 years,hardly a prolific liability, he made an error even shearers lashed out lets not write him off just yet ffs

[prefabtoon]

That's 3 too many He cannot control himself and admitted that.

[Guest Bordertoon]

Regarding Shelvey seeing a psych, although it might sound a little silly, it certainly wouldn't take a Freudian long to formulate his problem, with the following 2 key concepts (lifted from Wikipedia) pretty much summing Shelvey up for mine:

 

ACTING OUT - "Acting out is a psychological term from the parlance of defense mechanisms and self-control, meaning to perform an action in contrast to bearing and managing the impulse to perform it." (In other words, no doubt many of us would feel drawn to stamping on Dele Alli, but most of us would resist the urge to do so in Shelvey's position on Sunday).

 

REPETITION COMPULSION - "Repetition compulsion is a psychological phenomenon in which a person repeats a traumatic event or its circumstances over and over again. This includes reenacting the event or putting oneself in situations where the event is likely to happen again." (So, unconsciously, Shelvey can't help but create situations like the one on Sunday, and then has very little self-control to manage those situations well. Although I have my doubts that Dele Alli is well schooled in Freudian theory, I suspect that his rat cunning - or perhaps Pochettino's pre-match instructions - basically gave him the same insight. If you look at the incident closely, you can see Alli turn his head and think "oh, it's you, I'll kick the ball away and see what happens", and Shelvey then immediately fell into the trap, while hoping that his ridiculous acting would make it seem like an innocent accident).

 

Unfortunately, unless the psych can help Shelvey to conquer the two things above, then he's always going to be prone to the sort of disaster that we saw on Sunday (just like Joey Barton was before him - Liverpool away during our relegation battle under Shearer springs to mind). To make matters worse, not only can such incidents occur in key moments or matches, but they are actually more likely to occur at those times, because the player is more emotionally charged than usual, so heaven help us if Shelvey ever takes to the pitch for us in a cup final (actually, I have my doubts about Mitro too, but with him there's at least a chance - albeit a slim one - that he will grow out of the tendency as he gets older).

Kin hell! Sigmund Fraud... Wheeling him out is equivalent in footy terms to considering how the laces in the leather balls influence spin in free kicks.

 

Freud's ideas are alive and well in the 21st century, and form the basis of a living, breathing, and evolving intellectual tradition, spanning psychoanalysis and various forms of psychodynamic psychotherapy.

 

Your resistance to this truth suggests that you could benefit from some time on the couch 

[triggs]

3 red cards in 9 years,hardly a prolific liability, he made an error even shearers lashed out lets not write him off just yet ffs

Forgetting he got banned for racially abusing a bloke last season?

[sbnufc]

bald racist cunt

 

Would have expected them to be more imaginative

[Newintoon]

3 red cards in 9 years,hardly a prolific liability, he made an error even shearers lashed out lets not write him off just yet ffs

Forgetting he got banned for racially abusing a bloke last season?

 

allegedly if was a court of law pretty sure that would have been thrown out

[Away Toon]

I would transfer list him  and try and sel him. He's a liability, not that good and obviously a bit of a twat to boot. Not to be trusted.

[sbnufc]

I would transfer list him  and try and sel him. He's a liability, not that good and obviously a bit of a twat to boot. Not to be trusted.

Aye and go into a Premier League season with Hayden, Merino, Diame and Colback as our CM's.  Two unproven, one lost it and one absolutely shite

[madras]

I would transfer list him  and try and sel him. He's a liability, not that good and obviously a bit of a t*** to boot. Not to be trusted.

While that may be going a tad far givien ther squad depth, I'd guess many have pointed out that before the red card he'd been crap and many where I sit wanted him off at half time. Wonder if frustration at his own performance lead to the card ?

[Zero]

The problem is now every team will try to wind him up and every matches, and the match is over once he decided to have a go.  Now tell me what's the chance of him keeping calm for the rest of the season?  Remember the next red will gift us another 5 matches ban.  Correct me if I am wrong.

 

Sell him, or at least shift the tactical focus away from him.  We can't rely on him to survive.

[madras]

The problem is now every team will try to wind him up and every matches, and the match is over once he decided to have a go.  Now tell me what's the chance of him keeping calm for the rest of the season?  Remember the next red will gift us another 5 matches ban.  Correct me if I am wrong.

 

Sell him, or at least shift the tactical focus away from him.  We can't rely on him to survive.

Loads had a go at him last seaason and he was OK but sooner or later he'll go and it's usually bloody obvious .

[Anon]

bald racist cunt

 

Would have expected them to be more imaginative

 

Jellied eel cunt?

[The College Dropout]

3 red cards in 9 years,hardly a prolific liability, he made an error even shearers lashed out lets not write him off just yet ffs

Forgetting he got banned for racially abusing a bloke last season?

 

allegedly if was a court of law pretty sure that would have been thrown out

RAWK-like that

[nufcjb]

How many games is he suspended for?