It was a surprise move for Jonjo Sheley to make when he joined Arabian Falcons last month, and even more surprising as he insists it had nothing to do with money.
The six-cap England international was without a club over the summer after leaving Burnley at the end of his contract.
The 33-year-old ended a seven-year stint at Newcastle United in 2023 and went on to have short spells at Nottingham Forest, Caykur Rizespor, Eyupspor and then the Clarets last season.
He is now operating in the third tier of football in the United Arab Emirates, knows as the UAE Second Division League.
Many assumed the shock switch to Arabian Falcons was motivated by money, but Shelvey says otherwise, revealing there is not great riches to be earned at his new level of football.
Get personalised football updates every day
Sign up to our daily football newsletter and choose your team to get the latest news, rumours and more about your favourite team.
‘I’ve since seen a few things like “he’s gone there for money”. I’m thinking “what money? There’s no money in the UAE Second Division League”,’ Shelvey told the BBC.
‘The ballpark of the standard wage here is £2,000-a-month for a footballer. In terms of what I’ve earned throughout my career, that’s nothing.
‘My brother earns more working in a hotel in London, so it was never about coming here for the money.’
Explaining what has motivated his move to the team located in Dubai, he says it is the lifestyle available in UAE, compared to how he now sees life in the UK for him and his family.
‘I’m happy and content. I’m just at the stage now where I want to enjoy football. It’s about waking up, enjoying what I do and spending time with my family,’ he said.
‘If I’m honest, I don’t want my children growing up in England any more. We’re very lucky that we lived in a nice part of the UK but where I’m from, originally, you can’t have nice things in my opinion.
‘I’d never wear a watch in London any more. You can’t have your phone out in London, in my view.’
He added: ‘I just feel that the UK isn’t what it was 10 to 15 years ago.’
There were calls for Shelvey to earn more England caps
Shelvey has earned some high praise over his career, with Paul Merson claiming that he had the best passing range in the Premier League ahead of the 2018 World Cup.
‘Shelvey deserves a chance too,’ Merson wrote in the Daily Star on the midfielder’s possible World Cup selection that year.
‘No-one else passes the ball like him. He has the best range in the league in my opinion. Even Jack Wilshere doesn’t have his passing range.’
Jonjo Shelvey Premier League stats
Apps: 278
Goals: 23
Assists: 27
The midfielder did not get the nod and admitted it was a tough watch as England went on to reach the semi-finals in Russia without him.
‘It’s hard to sit there and watch because you want your country to do well but you want to be there at the same time,’ he told Sky Sports. ‘But you’ve just got to get behind them and support them.
‘I could have brought something to the team. But I’m not going to sit here and criticise the people that played because they did fantastically well.
‘Gareth Southgate has the right to pick whoever he wants. You get people saying that England could have done with that final ball but there’s nothing you can change, you have to get on with it and hopefully be selected in the future.’
Why Southgate left Shelvey out
Southgate was asked about Shelvey’s omission in 2018 when he was in good form for Newcastle and said: ‘We know all of the English players in the league, we know their strengths, we know their weaknesses. We think that the players that we’ve picked are ahead of the players we haven’t.
‘I think we assess somebody on how they fit into the way we want to play, first and foremost, that has to be the opening criteria.
‘We pick on how a player fits into our system, how their style of play fits, do they have all the attributes to play in the way we want to play and is their character and personality fit into group and how we want to be as a group for the month or eight weeks we’re going to be away.’