{"id":273015,"date":"2026-01-31T02:49:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-31T02:49:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/273015\/"},"modified":"2026-01-31T02:49:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-31T02:49:15","slug":"ex-cork-city-defender-kevin-long-linked-with-potential-loi-return","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/273015\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-Cork City defender Kevin Long linked with potential LOI return"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Corkman Kevin Long could be the latest former Ireland international making a League of Ireland return as top clubs mull over his availability.<\/p>\n<p> The 35-year-old, who won 17 Ireland caps between 2017 and 2020, is a free agent after being released by his last club, MLS outfit Toronto.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"> Long was signed from Cork City by Burnley as a 19-year-old, remaining with the Clarets for 13 years to earn cult status among the fanbase.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"> First-team opportunities were limited, forcing him into various loan stints at Accrington Stanley (three times), Rochdale, Portsmouth, Barnsley (twice) and MK Dons.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"> He moved permanently to Birmingham City in January 2023, spending just over a year at the Championship club before being lured to Canada by former national team manager John Herdman.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"> Long appeared 50 times in Major League Soccer but hasn\u2019t played since September when a hamstring injury curtailed his season. He wasn\u2019t retained for the 2026 season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"> It\u2019s understood last season\u2019s top three \u2013 Shamrock Rovers, Derry City, Shelbourne \u2013 are interested in acquiring the veteran as he looks to resettle in Ireland.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"> His former club Cork City is a natural link but their presence in the second tier and wage budget would be problematic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Corkman Kevin Long could be the latest former Ireland international making a League of Ireland return as top&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":273016,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[1113,61,60,2539,5782,5783,112],"class_list":["post-273015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-fai","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-league-of-ireland","tag-local-soccer","tag-premiership","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=273015"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273015\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/273016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=273015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=273015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=273015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}