Which pair of words shows that different letter combinations can represent the same speech sound?

The pair of words "phone" and "laugh" demonstrates that different letter combinations can represent the same speech sound because they both contain the "f" sound, despite being spelled differently. In "phone," the letter combination "ph" produces the /f/ sound, and in "laugh," the letter combination "gh" does the same. This illustrates the concept of different graphemes (letter combinations) representing the same phoneme (speech sound), which is an important aspect of phonics and understanding the complexities of English spelling and pronunciation.

Other pairs do not exemplify this relationship clearly. For example, "church" and "chorus" have distinct sounds represented by their different combinations, while "bow" can represent the same sound in two different meanings, and "hot" and "cold" represent completely different vowel sounds and meanings without any overlapping phonetic similarity.