Inspired by the potential Long-Cox partnership against Macedonia tonight, we let our imaginations run wild and came up with a few possible , if not entirely probable, football combinations.
Costa-Fortune: Jorge Costa and Jonathan Fortune
This partnership actually played together regularly in defence for Charlton Athletic during the 2001/02 season, never more famously than in December 2001, when the back four was Luke Young, Mark Fish, Jorge Costa and Jonathan Fortune, or ‘Young Fish Costa Fortune’.
Contrary to their hybrid name, Costa and Fortune came quite cheap. Costa joined on a season-long loan from Porto in 2001, while Fortune rose through the youth ranks at Charlton and still plays for the club.
Daft-Kuntz: Harry Butler Daft and Stefan Kuntz
The unfortunately-titled Harry Butler Daft won an FA Cup with Notts County in 1894 and played five times on the left wing for England. He’s long since passed away, but imagine the tongue-twisting commentators would have done if he was on the pitch at the same time as German midfielder Stefan Kuntz, once of Kaiserslautern and part of the Euro ’96 winning national side.
John Motson certainly wouldn’t relish the task of commentating on them, if the clip below is anything to go by.
Love-De Kock: Wagner Love and Johannes de Kock
We have a feeling that Brazilian striker Wagner Love and former Dutch international Johannes de Kock would form quite the duo, with the name alone enough to scare off the toughest and most macho defenders throughout the world.
After a brief flirtation with Flamengo and Palmeiras, Wagner was welcomed back to Russia (with love, of course) last season and is still banging in the goals for CSKA Moscow. De Kock, meanwhile, earned 13 caps for Holland and played for a number of middle of the road Dutch and German clubs before ‘de kock’ crew on his career at the beginning of the new millennium.
Fanni-Conquest: Rod Fanni and Norman Conquest
Marseille defender Rod Fanni’s parents must have been particularly sadistic. As if having a surname like Fanni wasn’t bad enough, they go and give him a first name like Rod to make him sound like a human hermaphrodite.
As for former Australian goalkeeper Norman Conquest, we don’t think we’ve ever heard of a more magnificent name in our lives.
Burns-Dickov: John Burns and Paul Dickov
Former Manchester City striker Paul Dickov was known for his robust approach, but even he would draw a line at the punishment suggested in the name of this combination. His associate John Burns is an Irish footballer who once played for Nottingham Forest and Bristol City, but plummeted down the leagues afterwards and finished his career with the mighty Hinckley Town.
We’ll be keeping an eye out to see if the Long-Cox pairing comes to pass this evening – you can follow our live minute-by-minute coverage of Macedonia v Ireland at joe.ie/football.
