The definitive A-Z of the greatest alliterative footballers

Matt Stead

This is indeed based entirely on Owen Otasowie making his Premier League debut for Wolves in midweek. Although that proved to us that we can no longer trust anyone…

 

Andrey Arshavin
Arsenal’s Andrey Arshavin? Absolutely awesome. An astonishingly adept attacker. Apex athlete. Amazing at Anfield.

 

Bosko Balaban
There must be something about Aston Villa, who can count Barry Bannan and Borja Baston among their BB guns. But Bosko Balaban will take some bloody beating.

 

Colin Calderwood
Who includes everyone on the email chain, wears Coco Chanel, loves the number 200, measures everything in cubic centimetres and plays Command & Conquer? Colin Calderwood. Colin Calderwood does.

 

Dion Dublin
It can only be the highest alliterative scorer in Premier League history (111 goals). Those chancers Didier Drogba (104) and Damien Duff (54) – second and third in that list respectively – can do one.

 

Emmanuel Eboue
Efan Ekoku (52) is not far off that pace but it can only be one man. West Brom fans might be interested to learn who the last manager to ever sign Emmanuel Eboue was.

 

Frank Fielding
Francesc Fabregas feels a bit like a cheat, particularly considering the competition posed by Federicos Fazio and Fernandez, as well as Frasers Forster and Fyvie, the latter of unused Wigan substitute in the 2013 FA Cup final fame. The nod in this instance goes to former England call-up Frank Fielding, who seemingly dropped the ‘ie’ at some point between spells at Blackburn and current club Millwall.

 

Gennaro Gattuso
Mad that he and Joe Jordan were only ever arguing about who the hardest same initial footballer was.

 

Hermann Hreidarsson
Sheffield United might as well sign him so he can beat Nathan Blake to the outright Premier League relegation record. Phil Jagielka is closer in age to him than he is to John Egan, to be fair.

 

Izzy Iriekpen
What do we have here then? Izzy Iriekpen, captain of the West Ham side that won the 1999 FA Youth Cup final by beating Coventry 9-0. That team, of course, contained a young Joe Cole; he and Iriekpen both left the club in summer 2003 and experienced slightly different careers.

 

Joseph-Desire Job
Jim Jefferies has a solid five-a-side cohort to choose from here, with Jussi Jaaskelainen, James Justin, Jermaine Jenas, Jiri Jarosik and Julian Joachim as accomplished a quintet as any. But this one belongs to Joseph-Desire Job and his weird Wikipedia picture.

 

Kevin Kyle
Kevin Keegan is banned on account of his name actually being Joseph. Get out of here with that nonsense and let a proper Kevin in on your way. No, not you Mr. Kilbane. The other Sunderland legend.

 

Lomana LuaLua
It kind of has to be. Lilian Laslandes was in with a shout and the spot belonged to Liam Lawrence before I remembered his Panenka miss in the 2004 Third Division play-off final penalty shootout at the Millennium Stadium. Daft sod.

 

Mario Melchiot
#mmlove.

 

Nyron Nosworthy
He broke Roy Keane.

 

Oguchi Onyewu
Owen Otasowie was the inspiration for this abomination, yet a modicum of research reveals his treachery. Ebeguowen, eh? Thought you could get away with that one? Fellow American midfielder Oguchi Onyewu, 20 years the Wolves man’s senior and now retired, would never do such a thing.

 

Paul Peschisolido
With a full name like Paolo Pasquale Peschisolido it’s pretty unfair on everyone else.

 

Qin Qi
Head here for debatable proof that this is a real person. Either way, this one took by far the longest to ‘research’ and frankly we’ve all had enough.

 

Rustu Recber
Turkey have reached the semi-finals of two major international tournaments. Rustu Recber was the only player to feature in both the 1-0 2002 World Cup defeat to Brazil and the 3-2 Euro 2008 loss to Germany. Plus he did that mint thing with the paint under his eyes.

 

Steve Stone
Spoilt for choice again here. There are a couple of Stefans in Savic and Schwarz, a Stephane Sessegnon, Scotts Sinclair and Sellars and even Santiago Solari if you want to go all continental. But it really is all about the Steves: Sidwell, Staunton, Sedgley, Slade, Simonsen and overall landslide winner Stone.

 

Teemu Tainio
Just imagine the sort of effort it would require to out-shithouse Didier Drogba on a normal day. Now remember that Teemu Tainio managed it in the dying embers of the 2008 League Cup final.

 

Ugo Ukah
One-cap Nigerian international. Born in Italy. Former Polish league champion. Once a Serbian Cup winner. Currently playing in Malaysia. Played three games for QPR a while ago. It’s not a great time to be well-travelled but still.

 

Victor Valdes
You could have 427 guesses at the identity of the only player to ever score a Premier League goal against Victor Valdes during his time at Manchester United and come nowhere even vaguely close to landing on Tyler Blackett.

 

Wayne Wanklyn
Grow up. He played 57 games for Reading between 1978 and 1981, scoring four goals before moving onto Aldershot, Basingstoke and finally Farnborough.

 

Xu Xin
A Guangzhou Evergrande bit-part player whose last appearance came alongside Paulinho and Jiang Guangtai, better known in these parts as Tyias Browning? Now we’re talking.

 

Yago Yao
Even better. The Sporting Gijon Player of the Year in 2000, two years after ‘The Supporters’ took that particular crown home. That’s the stuff.

 

Zheng Zhi
No-one else comes to mind.