Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football

Naming conventions for clubs?

There don't seem to be any clear naming conventions for clubs. This seems like it would be useful, as there don't seem to be any uniform standards. For example, for Italian clubs, most articles generally use punctuation between initials - e.g. A.C. Milan. But not all - we have ACF Fiorentina. For Spanish clubs, things are exactly the opposite - most don't include punctuation (FC Barcelona, RCD Espanyol, Sevilla FC) but others do (Real Madrid C.F., Villarreal C.F.). There doesn't seem to be any clear logic to this. There also seems to be little logic to what name is used at all. Real Madrid is both unambiguous and the most commonly used name, and yet we have Real Madrid C.F.. On the other hand, we have Real Betis, rather than Real Betis Balompié (or simply Betis). What is the logic here? For other clubs, it's even more puzzling. Where does Hertha BSC Berlin come from? The "B" in BSC stands for "Berliner" - there's no extra "Berlin" in the team's official name. Hertha BSC or Hertha Berlin would both seem like appropriate potential names, but Hertha BSC Berlin seems odd. With German clubs, in general, there seems to be a bewildering variety of naming forms used, in general. Why FC Bayern Munich but TSV 1860 München? This isn't a situation like Milan where the official name is in English - in both cases the official club name uses "München," but "Munich" is commonly used in English. There seems to be no reason to treat them differently.

Basically, outside of British Isles teams, which generally seem to follow a pretty nice, coherent pattern in terms of naming, there seem to be no rules whatever as to how club articles are named. Is there anything to be done about this? john k (talk) 00:48, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

See WP:NC#Sports teams for the established naming conventions for sports teams. – PeeJay 00:54, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Surely that is not very useful, and does not address any of the specific questions I raised. john k (talk) 01:39, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

The simple answer is that we don't have one. They've been formed mostly by case-by-case consensus on here over the years. Ideally we should have one, but it's never been ironed out. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:10, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

You're correct, we really should have one. At the very least the inconsistencies which have been very correctly pointed out above should be ironed out or a better rule be worked out. Peanut4 (talk) 11:47, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

The Bayern Munich case is the same as with Milan [1], their website (referenced in the sports team nc "the club's official web site has an English-language section" on which it calls the club Munich), though it would perhaps be easier to have all clubs at their official names (like it-wiki seem to have 1 2 3 4 5 6) — CHANDLER^#10 — 11:28, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

No, it's not the same as Milan - Milan is called "Milan" in Italian as well. Bayern Munich is called "Bayern München" in German. 1860 doesn't seem to have an English website, but it's certainly called "1860 Munich" in English just as much as Bayern is "Bayern Munich." See ESPN, for instance. Anyway, some kind of system ought to be worked out clearly. john k (talk) 17:40, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

I'd just like to point out that this is at the heart of what I've been trying to get at for the last month or so. I agree wholeheartedly that especially in the German club articles, there is no clear system for naming things. Random abbreviations that would surely be removed from English club names are left in, as are years. Other examples are Club Universidad Nacional, which is almost always referred to as Pumas, U.N.A.M., UNAM Pumas, etc. Similar situations exist with other Mexican clubs. I think that this issue deserves much more discussion. -- Grant.Alpaugh 19:16, 14 February 2009 (UTC) Another thing I wanted to add is that there are three things that need to be discussed: article title (self explanitory enough), complete official club name (the full legal name of the club), and short name (what appears over the infobox in the article and what should be used in competition articles as the piped link). We should ideally start with the complete, official name of the club and then pare down from there. I must say that I think when possible we should keep things like "F.C." in the article name only because it allows for a uniform standard that keeps things like Liverpool F.C. and Liverpool seperate, but doesn't require parentheticals. I also think that it is important that we recognize that while usually things like "F.C." are correctly abbreviate with full stops because the expression is an abbreviation from two seperate words, the "FC" in "FC Bayern München" comes from the one word expression "Fußball-Club" and as such full stops would be incorrect. Therefore if we adopt hard and fast rules, we should still be aware of linguistical issues. -- Grant.Alpaugh 19:24, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

The trouble with hard-and-fast rules is that real life somehow gets in the way. Just off the top of my head, there's F.C. United and Sheffield F.C. where dropping the FC from the name could be problematic/ambiguous/confusing. Beve (talk) 19:32, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

If I read you correctly Grant, about the use of F.C. etc, then I disagree on the point about dropping it where it isn't necessary. The full name of teams is Manchester United F.C. (or possibly more correctly Football Club), etc. Peanut4 (talk) 20:20, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

No, I meant that it should be kept in article titles. Moving Manchester United F.C. or Real Madrid C.F. to Manchester United or Real Madrid would mean that Liverpool F.C. or A.C. Milan should be moved to Liverpool or Milan, which quite obviously is not a viable option. What I'm advocating is the careful development of a set of naming conventions (both for article names and piped links) that allows for as few exceptions as possible. Sorry if I wasn't as clear about that above. -- Grant.Alpaugh 22:08, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't see where that's remotely relevant. The full name of the prime minister of the United Kingdom is James Gordon Brown. Wikipedia is generally not about using full names, and never has been. john k (talk) 21:39, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

A easy first step would probably be to divide name conversions into nations or languages. For example one thing could be "all english clubs have all football club, association football club etc abbreviated X.Y.Z." (if that is the common usage) "all swedish clubs have all football club, athletic club etc abbrivated XYZ", and so on... — CHANDLER^#10 — 20:31, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

This seems like a good start. john k (talk) 21:39, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree that is a good start, but I don't think that should be a good ending policy. If possible we should try to develop a uniform standard that can be used throughout the English encycopedia. -- Grant.Alpaugh 22:10, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

About Italy, just ignore how we use to call teams in Italy. F.C. Internazionale Milano's case explains it all (called colloquially as Inter in Italy, but often referred as Internazionale or Inter Milan in English), and also keep in mind no less than 60%-70% of Italian football teams share the name of the city where they come from. About ACF Fiorentina, the acronym part has no dots in it just because it is not an acronym, but just part of the name in that form, and has no official meaning (and the word Fiorentina in Italian means also "someone from Florence", and is colloqually used to refer to a popularly known type of steak), differently that what happens with A.C. Milan, where A.C. stand for "Associazione Calcio" (Football association). --Angelo (talk) 22:41, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

If the "ACF" is not an acronym, then our article doesn't do a very good job explaining this - it says "ACF" stands for "Associazione Calcio Firenze". If this is incorrect, we should change it. john k (talk) 07:31, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Now it does, I also provided a couple of sources. You can also have a look at the Lega Calcio website (the Italian organization that regulates the Serie A and Serie B leagues), and you'll see all clubs have no acronyms, but full names (e.g., Associazione Calcio ChievoVerona instead of A.C. ChievoVerona), and Fiorentina's full and official denomination is "ACF Fiorentina S.p.A.". --Angelo (talk) 21:48, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

The basic problem

Let's get to the heart of this here. The basic problem for any team outwith English-speaking nations is that WP:COMMONNAME causes inconsistency simply because most of them don't have common English names. By the rules of WP:ENGLISH, there is absolutely no doubt that the appropriate title for F.C. Internazionale Milano in en-WP is Inter Milan. However, the vast majority of Italian teams do not have common English names like this.

I would prefer the format to be as follows, if we have to pick a convention for every team:

1. If the team has an accepted, widely used and unambiguous English name which approximates the format used in Anglophone articles (i.e. a club name, together with the local initials for the equivalent of "football/sport/athletic club") we use that. Thus, F.C. Internazionale Milano, F.C. Bayern Munich, A.C.F. Fiorentina, Sporting C.P. and F.C. Spartak Moscow - yes, with the dots.
2. If the team does not have an accepted, widely used and unambiguous English name which approximates the format used in Anglophone articles, but does have an English name which is accepted, widely used and unambiguous, we use that. Thus, Red Star Belgrade (other titles not commonly used), PSV Eindhoven ("PSV" ambiguous).
3. If the team does not have any accepted, widely used and unambiguous English name, we go with the official translation or closest approximation to it. (come up with your own examples).

Thoughts? Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 00:28, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Dots should be used only with acronyms, so it is ACF Fiorentina without dots, as I explained above. Obviously your proposal must be refined and corrected in some points (i.e., giving a way to define factually when a name is accepted, widely used and unambiguous, and also about the 'closest approximation' issue), but it's a good point. --Angelo (talk) 00:49, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

It is my understanding that, when it comes to punctuation, it is no longer the custom to add dots to the ends of abbreviations such as CD, MP or FC. Granted, adding dots to abbreviations such as these was once commonplace, but that is no longer the case. Therefore, I make the case that we need no longer follow outmoded practices. – PeeJay 01:03, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Though I personally prefer the dots, I must say that when you watch Champions League games they always include the abbreviations without dots, i.e. the upcoming round will feature the tie Manchester United FC - FC Internazionale Milano. I think that partly corroborates PeeJay's point. I would also like to again emphasize that there is probably often going to be a (slight) difference between the "article name" and the club's "short name" because of the whole "FC/CD/AS/whatever" issue. Finally I think we should encourage the use of "correct" names whenever they are in contradiction with the "common name" (e.g. Sporting Lisbon should be Sporting Portugal since the word Lisbon never appears in the club name, PSV Eindhoven is another example that should be just moved to PSV, as well as Hertha BSC Berlin since the Berlin comes from the BSC part and should be just Hertha Berlin). -- Grant.Alpaugh 01:41, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I disagree with your opinion regarding the naming of Sporting Clube de Portugal. "Hertha Berlin" I can live with, but to refer to Sporting CP as "Sporting Portugal" doesn't make sense (not saying that I think "Sporting Lisbon" is correct, but it's certainly more common than "Sporting Portugal". For them, I think it has to be "Sporting", "Sporting CP", "Sporting Lisbon" or "Sporting Clube de Portugal", but certainly not just "Sporting Portugal"). – PeeJay 02:04, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

And yet there it is, right there on the badge. -- Grant.Alpaugh 04:10, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

And Bayern Munich's badge says "FC Bayern München", but that is not their common name in English. Beve (talk) 08:43, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

If removing all dots when it comes to club names, it would at least bring consistency. I also have noticed what Grant noted about UEFA, that they don't juse the dots in their Champions League productions, this is also seen on their website Eng clubs Esp clubs (S.A.D. is excluded on all clubs here which many clubs seem to have in their official name[2]). On Hertha BSC Berlin that's been discussed a bit, "Hertha BSC Berlin" is at least the text that appears on the crest (probably from there the English common name has come? Yesterday in the Hertha - Bayern game the German tv production even had the scoreboard as "Berlin - FC Bayern"). But perhaps (and Hertha might fall under this any way) one thing we could do is for article names or piping "don't use the city the club comes from if it's not in the club name" or how that should be phrased that would effect clubs like Sporting CP, PSV, Hertha(?), AEK, AIK are just some clubs from the top of my head that either through English media or UEFA get their city paste on the end — CHANDLER^#10 — 09:50, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm happy with removing the dots everywhere, but it has to be done on the UK articles as well. From the discussion above, it'd definitely be "Sporting CP" (or "Sporting C.P.") and "Hertha BSC" (or Hertha B.S.C.) by the logic we're running with here - tacking the city on is no better than saying "Glasgow Rangers" to me, and we generally prefer the shortest form we can get away with if part of the title is commonly abbreviated. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:18, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Didn't we have this discussion already? cheers, Struway2 (talk) 10:24, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, WP:CCC and the current NC gives inconsistencies there might also be a need to split naming conventions between sports and perhaps continents, I mean American professional sport teams usually don't have "Pittsburgh Football Club" or "Steelers Football Club" but "Pittsburgh Steelers". In that franchise system the naming convention is pretty straight forward, though other places it might not be so straight forward. — CHANDLER^#10 — 10:36, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

The conclusions reached there are too vague to be of use in cases where there are still potential conflicts. They need to be tightened. That's the purpose of this thread. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:33, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't see how that is particularly useful. Anyway, I like Chris Cunningham's suggestion, generally. john k (talk) 07:31, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Some points from a project non-member, in case the views of someone who hasn't been through all these arguments before are considered useful. (If not, just don't bother to read them!)
1) I don't know whether there was as much agonising as I see here, but there doesn't seem to be the same problem with geography. The WP article on Munich begins "Munich… is the capital city of Bavaria, Germany". It does not say "München is the capital city of Bayern, Deutschland". It takes the position that, in the English language Wikipedia, the English names for a thing is the default. But in doing so, it makes asap the important point that the local name differs from this: "Munich (German: München...) is the capital city of Bavaria, Germany". It would be consistent with this style to say "Bayern Munich (German: Bayern München...)"
2) I believe that it would also be consistent to use the name by which a club is commonly known to English speakers, even if the difference is not one of city name in local tongue. For example "Inter Milan (Full name: Football Club Internazionale Milano; usually referred to in Italy as 'Internazionale' or just 'Inter')..." This may look long-winded, but it isn't half as long-winded as the current version, which starts with the club's full name and later finds it necessary to insert the explanation: "The term Inter Milan is a nickname used primarily in the English-speaking world to differentiate it from other teams named 'Inter', and is not used within Italy." When an editor finds it necessary to say that a thing is known as something else in "the English-speaking world", it's generally a very strong sign that all is not well. The English-speaking world is the principal readership of the English language Wikipedia, not some fringe group with annoying little linguistic habits, as implied here!
3) Company/corporation designations would hinder not help clarity. If you start adding to the names of clubs such terms as 'S.p.A.'(as hinted at above) it will confuse actions by/against/about business entities with the clubs themselves ('S.p.A.' is roughly equivalent to 'plc', 'Ltd' or 'Inc'). Clubs and their ownership are, in important senses, not the same thing. If Leeds United Football Club Limited were to sell up to another owner next week and use the money to buy the Waterford Crystal works, it would be the footballers and not the glassmakers who carried on the League 1 campaign.
4) Personally, I am not in favour of using 'FC' and similar at all if it can be avoided, but if you must, there is no clarity whatever gained from putting the full points in and making it 'F.C.', so why complicate the job? (see BBC, EU, USAF, NATO, IBM etc). Grubstreet (talk) 02:58, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Weighing up support here

Can I get an idea of the level of support for the guidelines given above? And for a preference for keeping the dots globally, or removing them globally? Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 09:59, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I am a bit of a fan of consistency and simplicity, so as far as dots go, I think we shouldn't have any. For the rest, WP:COMMONNAME should rule, but of course there is endless argument about what the common name actually is. Personally I don't care that much as long as the usual suspects are redirected - once I have followed a link or searched for "Inter Milan" or whatever, I don't take too much notice that the page has redirected to F.C. Internazionale Milano, but If I were to proffer an opinion, Grubstreet who is apparently lost as (s)he appears far too sensible to be hanging around football discussions:-) has summed it up pretty well.--ClubOranje^T 23:39, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I would support Grubstreet's idea regarding Inter Milan. It is strange to point out in an English encyclopaedia what the English speaking world refers to something as. I assume this is a compromise for non-native editors/readers. Either way, it is ridiculous that we have to go about explaining a disambiguation in the lead. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 01:00, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

La Liga effect

I just came acress the La Liga effect article, a quick google serch indicates that this is not a commonly occuring phrase. The article stinks of WP:OR and needs to be deleted King of the North East 21:00, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Agree. Nothing in the article to evidence its notability. Peanut4 (talk) 21:09, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Delete it. Seems to be some type of propaganda article promoting English football. Hubschrauber729 (talk) 21:10, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Without attested use, it looks like a neologism to me. Knepflerle (talk) 17:59, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Original research, neologism and POV rolled into one. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 18:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Comment - If La Liga places more emphasis on defence, why has it seen more goals per game than the Premier League in all but two of the last ten seasons? (Source) DitzyNizzy (aka Jess)|(talk to me)|(What I've done) 12:01, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This article was recently recreated. Hubschrauber729 (talk) 01:56, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Attention: proposed migration of all football biographies to use {{infobox Football biography 2}}

Current version

New version

WikiProject Football Personal information Full name George Elder Burley Height 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) Position(s) Right-back Team information Current team Scotland (Manager)

WikiProject Football Personal information Full name George Elder Burley Height 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) Position(s) Right-back Team information Current team Scotland (Manager) Senior career* Years Team Apps (Gls) 1973–1985 Ipswich Town 1985–1988 Sunderland 1988–1989 Gillingham 1989–1991 Motherwell 1991–1993 Ayr United 1993 Falkirk 1993–1994 Motherwell 1994 Colchester United International career – Scotland U21 – Scotland U23 1979–1982 Scotland Managerial career 1991–1993 Ayr United 1994 Colchester United 1994–2002 Ipswich Town 2003–2005 Derby County 2005 Heart of Midlothian 2005–2008 Southampton 2008– Scotland *Club domestic league appearances and goals

Due to accessibility issues with the current {{infobox Football biography}} template, for the last few months work has been ongoing to create a replacement, {{infobox Football biography 2}}. The new version has several other advantages, in that it has a much cleaner codebase (which makes it easier to improve, customise and maintain) and better presents the data from a semantic point of view.

This has been deployed over various articles over the last few months, but this is now the big push. I'm now confident that the template covers everything that we require from the infobox for it to be successfully rolled out over all 40,000+ footy biographies which currently use the old design. As such, this change will be bot-assisted.

To the right is the side-by-side comparison of the old and new versions of the infobox template. There are some minor differences to the layout, mostly to improve on accessibility and semantic value. In addition, it has several new features, as detailed in the template documentation.

Questions and comments are welcome. If there are no major issues, I'll try to have a bot request in place in a few days' time.

Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:44, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good to me - and don't forget to change the deafult template on the Players page. GiantSnowman 15:52, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree 100% with the proposed move. The new box is MUCH more user-friendly. --JonBroxton (talk) 15:54, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I completely agree with this move. However, I have one question about the template itself: why is it that there seems to be a larger gap between each row in the "Senior career", "National team" and "Teams managed" sections than between each row in the "Personal information" section? – PeeJay 16:15, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

It seems to be okay. DeMoN2009 16:17, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Maybe it does on your browser, but on mine it looks like there's a slightly bigger gap and I don't like it. – PeeJay 16:24, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

There shouldn't be; as far as the template logic is concerned, they're all the same line height. Can you provide a screenshot if there's a measurable difference in your setup? Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:26, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Here is a screenshot of what I'm seeing. Although it is possible that it is an optical illusion, the gaps definitely seem to me to be of different sizes. – PeeJay 17:06, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

My view is identical to PeeJay2K3's, Firefox 5.0.3. It has always been like that since infobox 2 inception. However, it is an "optical illusion" likely caused by the boldness of the titles under personal section, more noticeable when placed adjacent to the original infobox (which actually was inconsistent) as the secion sizes differ between versions because of this. To prove this I enlarged my view of this page and measured the spaces between each line. Try it yourself PeeJay. --ClubOranje^T 01:45, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I have the same views. If anything the old style infobox has far larger gaps in the personal section than the club sections, which is probably what is creating the optical illusion. Peanut4 (talk) 01:51, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

What I see isn't an optical illusion. On the two versions of the infobox above as seen by me in Firefox 3.0.4, the full name is pretty well level in both boxes, while the playing position, the last field in the personal section, is significantly lower in the old (left-hand) version; thus the lines are closer together in the new version. In the playing section, the first club, Ipswich Town, is lower in the old (left-hand) box, but the last club, Colchester United, is higher in the old (left-hand) box; thus the lines are closer together in the old version. It doesn't bother me personally, but it's definitely not an optical illusion. cheers, Struway2 (talk) 09:04, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

You're reaching the wrong conclusion from your observations. The reason that the various fields seem to line up when they shouldn't is because the padding around the section headers has been increased in the new template: you can literally count the pixels between the various data lines to confirm that the spacing between each one is the same. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 09:15, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

The physical distance on my screen between the bottom of the words "Ipswich Town" and the bottom of the words "Colchester United" is 41mm on the LH (old) box and 45mm on the RH (new) box. Similarly, in the personal section, the physical distance between the bottom of "Full name George Burley" and the bottom of "Right-back" is 25mm on the left and 28mm on the right. All measurements are approximate. And as I say, it doesn't bother me, and perhaps I'm not understanding the terminology, wouldn't be the first time :-) but I really don't see how this can be a function of section header padding. cheers, Struway2 (talk) 09:28, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

The reasoning is because the line height is actually inconsistent on the old template; line heights are deliberately reduced for the club fields. On the new one, all data fields are set to the same line height which is somewhere in between the two old values. So yes, one section is shorter and the other longer, but the end result is actually more consistent. PeeJay's original observation that there was a difference in line heights between the two sections is only true in comparison to the old sections, and not actually to each other. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:03, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm with you now (finally). Thanks for spelling it out for those of us a little slow of understanding :-) cheers, Struway2 (talk) 13:10, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree with making the infobox more user friendly, I have an idea for replacing the pc/nt update paramater before this template is widely rolled out. Would it be possible to replace the update parameters with:

| currentclub-update =

| nationalteam-update =

| manager-update =

I think it is important to provide a manager update parameter as many of the non-anglo manager biographies are left displaying inaccurate info for years. Changing the wording for pcupdate and ntupdate would make it much more clear what the parameters are for to inexperienced editors. I don't know how many thousand updates I've seen that make no change to the update parameters when it is as easy as writing ~~~~~. Any thoughts? King of the North East 16:18, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Good idea. Once we've got a bot set up, I'll change the parameter name prior to it starting so that every existing instance is updated to use the new names as well. This shouldn't be difficult. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:26, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

This is not a dealbreaker, but would you consider removing the height attribute? It is not very informative and is frequently the source of misinformation and edit wars over differing sources. Qwghlm (talk) 17:49, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, I don't think that potential edit wars are a good reason to remove a parameter. Also, height is a staple piece of information for sportspeople, and it's included in both the Sky Sports Football Yearbook and the PFA Footballers' Who's Who, so it's definitely sourceable for players in the English leagues at least. – PeeJay 17:58, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh yes, you've got to keep the height parameter. GiantSnowman 19:10, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I think height is a key attribute which deserves keeping. I don't think citing edit wars is a particularly good reason for losing it either. Otherwise, everything else looks good to go. Peanut4 (talk) 19:27, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

The most evident visible difference between the examples shown, apart from the name being outside the frame, is the presence of en dashes in the years column for under age internationals. Is this just a minor inconsistency, a change of policy, an illustration of a new possibility, or something that is forced by a field that cannot be blank?

I've found an answer to my own query here: screen readers for the blind don't like the first row being blank. I wonder whether some "invisible" character works just as well: it would look less like emphasising a gap in knowledge to those of who take the input visually, if "spacebar" will be no more intrusive to our sight deprived users than "en-dash". Kevin McE (talk) 22:13, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

The problem with dashes, space bars etc. is that editors will tend to leave unknown data out rather than put in a dash etc. unless the template forces it. I have recently created an article on Billy Bevis - I don't know when he played for his first youth club and I doubt if that information will ever be available. The infobox looks fine without a dash in lieu of the dates, and I think question marks look daft. I realise the need for accessibility to all, but unless I buy a screen reader I have great difficulty understanding the precise problem. Daemonic Kangaroo (talk) 22:48, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Invisible characters don't work, no. Whether it "looks fine" or "looks daft" is pretty subjective; personally, I'd far rather that if one does not have data for when a person was at a club then it isn't added to the infobox in the first place, because it's unverified. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 09:15, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Just because the dates of when a player was at his first youth club are unverified doesn't mean that his very presence at that club is unverified. In one of the books I have on Gillingham players, there are a lot of player profiles which list clubs as (for example) Margate (youth), Dover (youth), Gillingham (apprentice to professional, 1955-63), Millwall (1963-65), etc etc. In this case service at Margate and Dover is clearly verified but without exact dates..... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 09:21, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

If the year is not definitively known then I don't see the problem with a question mark. We need something in the first column for accessibility reasons - it doesn't really matter that much what it is, but I'd rather we standardised on something. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:03, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I notice that, although the spacebar cannot, a non breaking space (typed as & n b s p ; without the spaces) can trick <noinclude> fields: can it not trick the screen reader too? It is a bit of a nuisance to type, but I'd prefer it to unsightly dashes and question marks. My second choice would be a simple full stop, on account of its unobtrusiveness: an encyclopaedia should not draw attention to its gaps in knowledge with blatant symbols. Kevin McE (talk) 19:12, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

AFAIK screen readers literally ignore anything which can't be read out loud - this definitely includes non-breaking spaces. You might want to ask on WT:ACCESS what their preferred solution for this kind of thing is. IMO a dash is far less unsightly than a full stop - it conveys "not available" without looking like a syntax error. But that's not something to hold up adoption at any rate. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 19:46, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

This is about the example chosen, nothing really to do with the new template, although answers to my query might precipitate a change in the fixed text. Is it appropriate to include a role with a national association in a field marked as "Current Club" ? Kevin McE (talk) 21:44, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I have edited the infobox on the actual George Burley article to remove the National team from the current club field and also to remove the dashes in the year column for the under-age internationals. These are minor matters and don't detract from the improved functionality of the new template. Daemonic Kangaroo (talk) 22:07, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't suppose it'd be possible to also merge in {{infobox football official}}, which (although used predominantly for referees) could also possibly be used for Directors, League Chairman, FIFA personnel etc so that all football related bios can use the same infobox? Nanonic (talk) 13:25, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

This is a good idea, especially as players often go into football administration when they retire. Michel Platini is one example off the top of my head. – PeeJay 13:34, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

The two now operate on the same codebase (I converted the football official one a while back, as a dry run for this), so this is actually much easier now. But let's not let that hold this particular move up for the time being. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:53, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm liking all the changes but can I ask what's going on with the "honours" drop down? Is it for the Olympic teams or for general competitions too? Gold, silver and bronze seem strange if the latter is to be included. Should this be narrowed down? Sillyfolkboy (talk) 01:14, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

One player I know has it is Bixente Lizarazu. I don't know who added it there, but [s]he used it for everything, when I added to Brian Laudrup I took everything... on "Gold, silver and bronze seem strange if the latter is to be included", isn't it refereed to as that in English? It's at least in Swedish, where one would say they won "SM Guld" if they've won the Swedish championships in some sport, down to "SM brons", if a Swede win a World championship it's "VM Guld", won the Olympics "OS Guld"... I know this is the English WP but we seem to use it in places like the UEFA Euro 2008 infobox, where gold silver bronze are synonymous with first second third... And I think it's commonly known enough that "gold etc" means the winner in English ch¹⁰ · 02:40, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

The documentation page does say "Olympic medal templates can be added here". IMO we're best leaving the medals section exclusively for Olympic medals, or people will go crazy. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 09:09, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree as, at least in the case of English, no one would say Chelsea won silver in the league last year! The honours column could grow to an extraordinary length if people include all the different types of honours won. Perhaps the section should be used solely for Olympic medals, with the name of the section reflecting this? Either way, I'm happy to see that this function has been introduced as it caused me all sorts of trouble before. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 10:11, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I added the honours section to the infobox, and filled in Lizarazu's infobox. I don't think it makes sense to limit it to Olympic medals, given that the Olympic games is such a minor part of football, it would be unrepresentative. I agree that perhaps we should change "Gold" and "Silver" to "Winner" or "Runner-up" but that's easily done. Nor does it really matter how big the list gets, as it's collapsible. Also, by "Olympic medal templates can be added here" I meant that we can use the templates originally designed for the olympics, not that they should onlt be used for that competition. P.S. There are no silver medals in the Premier League. ArtVandelay13 (talk) 14:20, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I disagree that the length doesn't matter - infoboxen are meant to be at-a-glance, and should not be used for detailed listings which belong in the article prose. Medal templates for Olympic athletes have established usage - those for other sportspeople don't. Adding this opens a huge can of worms when it comes to established players - Ryan Giggs's infobox would be about three feet long, for instance. As for there being "no silver medals in the Premier League", the runner-up sport in the cups has traditionally been entitled to a European berth, and is thus just as notable as a winners medal. By simply saying "only Olympic medals are allowed" we short-circuit that debate. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 14:54, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Common usage on athletes' infoboxes goes beyond the Olympic games, and similarly artists have a collapisble list of awards and nominations. There is no reason why footballers should be different, and absolutely no reason to single out the Olympics, which is a minor competition in football terms. It fits in with the infobox in the way that the rest of the fields do - it's a summary list that can (and should) be expanded in the article prose. And again, the potential length isn't an argument - you could theoretically make the same case for clubs for people like John Burridge. The collapsible feature means a long list has no adverse effect on the formatting of an article. ArtVandelay13 (talk) 16:39, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm unconvinced, but it isn't a pressing concern anyway - we can discuss it post-migration. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 20:44, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

As this infobox was changed primarily for accessibility reasons, can someone who knows about these things confirm the collapsible bit is accessible as described at MOS:SCROLL. thanks, Struway2 (talk) 16:46, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

MOS:SCROLL has a specific exemption for infoboxen. That said, this is on the grounds that the contents are duplicated in the article body, which is why I'm opposed to comprehensive honours lists being added in the medals section (as they aren't always present in the body either). Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 20:44, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I think we could make up set "rules" for the honours, as Art said, actors for example have a rather (imo) better looking style of awards, and we could divide it into perhaps to only show domestic titles, cup winning and runner-up and World Cup, Euro, Copa America, Olympics etc show down to bronze/third place if they're given. And as I said, remake it like perhaps the Actor infobox which I think has a better structure for awards. ch¹⁰ · 20:57, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

That's naughty... MOS:SCROLL actually links to WP:MOS#Scrolling lists, which I agree says they're acceptable with no provisos. But the MOS:SCROLL that I was referring to was WP:ACCESS#Scrolling and collapsible sections, whose shortcut claims to be MOS:SCROLL, which says "Collapsible sections are useful in navboxes and infoboxes and are widely used outside the article namespace; in these instances, care should be taken to ensure that the content will still be acessible on devices which do not support JavaScript and/or CSS." (my italics, highlighting the bit I was checking on). I'm just off to point out the duplication on the relevant talk pages. cheers, Struway2 (talk) 22:28, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, how can one check if it works without Java or CSS? For example the most widely used like {{Navbox}} ch¹⁰ · 22:47, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

JavaScript (note: not the same thing as Java) can be disabled in one's browser prefs. In Firefox, one can turn off CSS styling by going to View -> Page Style -> No Style. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 01:17, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

AFAIK all collapsible lists on WP simply remain expanded if JS is disabled, which is graceful degradation. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 01:17, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm all for migrating to the new template - if it's relatively easy to do, won't break anything, make it easier for users to edit them and make our articles more friendly for people with accessibility issues: how can I say no? Nanonic (talk) 15:02, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I've played around about with possibilities for the "medals part" to try and make it more compact with the help of {{Navbox}}, in my little sandbox. Why the blue is different is because I used "navbox" as bodyclass instead of "vcard vevent ". The honours are from Cafú (atm hardcoded), only first place honours would be used or it wouldn't be able to be as compact. ch¹⁰ · 01:35, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

That seems awfully hackish for the sake of minor formatting updates. However, if you want to try it out in a more standard location, I've added a sandbox and test cases for the template at the usual locations. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:41, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Template:Football squad player

On Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Sunderland A.F.C. a comment was brought up regarding the squad list about accompanying the flag with its countries name. I think there should be a change made to this template to include the name as it is going against MOS:FLAG#Accompany flags with country names. Obviously some discussion would be required, opinions? Sunderland06 (talk) 17:39, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I think that there should be a change to MOS:FLAG. Since all flagicons now link to the country that they refer to, there is no need for them to be accompanied by the country name in text. – PeeJay 17:44, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree that I'd rather change the MOS:FLAG than the template structure — CHANDLER#10 — 19:22, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Also agreed. GiantSnowman 19:26, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but I thought that problem was resolved at the previous FAC as a non-existing problem and the squad template is correct as it is. Peanut4 (talk) 19:32, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

It was, but it has been brought up again. I agree that the MOS should be changed, and I'll pop into the talk page in a mo. Cheers. Sunderland06 (talk) 19:34, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

The MoS is unlikely to be changed. I'd far rather we brought ourselves into line with the existing MoS. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 08:47, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

On a similar yet different note, I've had the thought about flagicon being used when it comes to football teams and other sports. Where a clubs and players in how I see it, represent a football association, which may differ from either where the club is located or something like that. One of the mostly known in Europe is probably Monaco which at is article is described as "a Monegasque football club", but it is associated with the French Football Federation not the Monegasque Football Federation, so when they compete especially in Europe, they represent the FFF, and should it be allowed would have had the logo of the FFF if that was the custom we used, right? But instead we go by the flag associated with the FA, so perhaps it would be useful to somehow bring that to the reads attention, for example (and some may disagree) in the 2008 FA Cup, Cardiff City had the opportunity to qualify for Europe through the English FA, rather than through the Welsh, and had they done so, I'd say they represented the English FA in the UEFA Cup and should've had a English flag. And i think it would be good in a instance like that if the flag would perhaps link to the english FA rather than England as the English FA also span three clubs in Wales (perhaps similarly to how the English cricket team and the ECB span both England and Wales) — CHANDLER#10 — 19:51, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Flags that are linked to the relevant country article (i.e., the name is excluded) aren't helpful for printed versions of articles, as I've found to my cost several times. - Dudesleeper / Talk 11:43, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Fortunately, though, Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopaedia (yes, I know that's not what the idea behind WP:NOTPAPER is, but it does hold true that Wikipedia is not intended to be printed). – PeeJay 11:53, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, no; that's absolutely not true. Wikipedia should ideally be media-neutral, and should work as well as possible in non-Web forms such as printed or audio. We shouldn't be making that any harder than it already is. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 08:47, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Top scorers

On the Premier League 2008–09 article, there is a dispute over how the table should be laid out. Either like this, or like this. The Football League 2008–09 article has it laid out like the second option, where as Serie A 2008–09 and Bundesliga 2008–09 doesn't use a table. Which is viewed as the best way to show the information? Eddie6705 (talk) 13:18, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

The latter is better in my opinion; clearer, simpler, easier to read at-a-glance. Multiple editors seem to agree, as it is often getting changed, but one editor always reverts it back. Beve (talk) 18:08, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

It's the same at the FA Cup 2008–09, where the content is reverted back to the former option despite numerous editors changing it to the latter. I feel the latter is much easier to read. Peanut4 (talk) 20:13, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

We don't rowspan the league table when teams are tied on points, so I don't see why this should be different. The only thing that is shared is the rank. Nothing else should be rowspanned. -- Grant.Alpaugh 20:23, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

if Rank is shared on a top scorer list then by default the amount scored is shared, the second option is easier to read, also the point about league tables is redundant as aside from the start of the season it is virtually impossible for 2 teams to be tied for a position because of all the stuff used to separate them, goal dif and goals scored etc. Skitzo (talk) 23:14, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

That's a good point, because in a league two teams can't share position (as there are always tiebreakers) while there can be shared winners as top scorersb— CHANDLER#10 — 23:17, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't see the logic that all tables have to be the same format. Beve (talk) 00:13, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Using the same format throughout articles creates consistency and keeps articles from looking sloppy. The rank is shared collectively by the players who are tied, but their goals were not scored collectively. you're arguing that in the league table all the teams on 26 points should have the points collumn rowspanned so that it would be "easier to read" that they are tied on points, when it is easy to see that they all have the same points total. I don't see what is so confusing about this. -- Grant.Alpaugh 00:21, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

No I'm not, you're putting words into my mouth. I haven't said anything about the league table. Beve (talk) 00:56, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Bolding internationals

And we've got another IP bolding the international players in the Current squad sections of articles about football club: 79.178.134.192 (talk · contribs). This user is the umpteenth IP address to do this, in violation of Wikipedia:WikiProject Football/Clubs#To be avoided. Does anyone have any idea where they could be coming from? They keep coming out of the woodwork, and I find it hard to believe that this many IPs are making exactly the same edits, independent of each other. Aecis·(away) ^talk 23:48, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Very possibly because they see one club with bold players and think they'll do the same elsewhere. Once there are no clubs with bold players for internationals then the problem is less likely to crop up. Though it still seems a bit odd that it keeps arising. Peanut4 (talk) 23:51, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

4 Associations Tournament

I think this needs to be protected because it is getting attention from IPs making lame pov edits about the naming of Ireland (yawn). Jmorrison230582 (talk) 00:39, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Just because I'm an ip it doesn't mean I'm a second class citizen. Facts are facts, you are reverting the edits because of your opinion aka POV.194.125.117.215 (talk) 00:43, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Maybe I would take you more seriously if you made a constructive edit someplace, rather than just reverting good faith edits. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 00:54, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree, this needs to be protected (semi or full) to end the edit war. I won't do it because I've become involved. Please use the talk page to come to a consensus. Aecis·(away) ^talk 00:46, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Article 4 of the Irish Constitution confirms that "The name of the State is Éire, or, in the English language, Ireland." 'Republic' is used to differentiate the country from the name of the island itself. But either way, this is a petty argument guys. GiantSnowman 00:48, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the second use of "Ireland" has to be Republic of Ireland to be consistent with the first sentence. Someone reading that without a clue what you mean by Ireland won't know whether Northern Ireland or Republic of Ireland is the host nation if it just says "Ireland". Jmorrison230582 (talk) 00:54, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

What first use of Republic of Ireland? If it is to be protected. Full protection is the only correct thing to do. As said Ireland is the name of the country and the above editor doesn't seem to like that.194.125.117.215 (talk) 00:58, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I think I have come up with a suggestion, which although not perfect, may avoid further edit warring - using Ireland (piping to Republic of Ireland national football team) in the first sentence, and then using Ireland in the rest of the article). Jmorrison230582 (talk) 01:02, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes the suggestion works fine. Hopefully now the edit warring will stop.194.125.117.215 (talk) 01:24, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't see why it shouldn't be kept as ROI as Fifa (http://www.fifa.com/associations/association=irl/index.html) clearly refer to them as that, be it in fixtures/results or news. Uksam88 (talk) 08:31, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Suspected hoax player

Gautham Sriram - apparently an Indian international playing in Spain for Racing de Santander - has no Google hits and there's no mention of him on the Racing site. Oh, and the page also claims he made his pro debut at 11! I've never come across a hoax player before, so I've tagged it as a suspected hoax and PRODded it - is this acceptable action? GiantSnowman 19:42, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

As it is a blatant hoax, you can tag it as {{db-g3}}. --Carioca (talk) 20:18, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Move / merge / split backlog cleared

I finally got round to closing all of our open move / merge / split requests, some of which were over a year old. Woohoo. I don't think any were contentious. Let's try to keep on top of these from now on! Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:57, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Good effort, nice one man! GiantSnowman 14:04, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Well done, the Nominations for deletion and page moves section looks so tidy I think I'll have a look through the new page archives for some fresh junk to fill it up with ;) King of the North East 14:40, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Well done. I've been trying to keep on top of the AfDs, Prods and some of the CfDs and TfDs, but I'm not always au fait what to do with the merges and page move requests. Peanut4 (talk) 19:00, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Be bold. :) Even if a move is eventually reverted, making a move on it tends to give it the required kick in the right direction. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 19:32, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Walter "Gualteri" Wild

The very first president of FC Barcelona was an Englishman, Walter Wild, who was known in Spanish as Gualteri Wild. The article is nothing more than a basic stub with some references, but I feel it deserves improving - any help? Thanks in advance, GiantSnowman 18:00, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

82.17.244.99

Could someone please check out the contributions of this vandal. I have no idea how he/she has only ever been blocked once! Mattythewhite (talk) 19:29, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Probably could do with being reported, can't seem to find them making a constructive edit anywhere. Uksam88 (talk) 19:33, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

It's only made 50-odd edits anyway, although they all appear to be childish vandalism. It's an NTL address, hence ADSL, so at least if it's blocked it's unlikely that the perp will go IP-hopping. Issue a final for persistence if it happens again. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 19:39, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Categories about ethnic heritage and WP:BLP

I noticed that someone added Category:Costa Ricans of Black African descent to several footballer articles recently, and I've also noticed similar categories added to Latin American footballer articles based on surnames (players with Italian surnames get Uruguayans of Italian descent or players with German surnames get Argentines of German descent). While these categories are interesting and potentially useful, I've never seen a source to support the category (typically the category appears reasonable because Windell Gabriels is most likely someone with African heritage and Horacio Humoller probably has a German ancestry). Should the categories be removed unless a source is added to the article to support the ancestry claim? Best regards. Jogurney (talk) 22:13, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Category:Black Britons was added to countless number of footballers recently. While all I saw were correct, I can't recall one that actually had a source in the text to say he was black. And quite frank, I don't see why text should say a player was black. I was always under the impression, categories should be only added when there was something to back up the claim in the article itself. So, I'd agree with you that the categories ought to be removed unless a source is added. Peanut4 (talk) 22:19, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

We've been pretty successful recently in beating back these contrived Venn Diagram-style ethnicity/nationality categories: I say take them all the CfD on the grounds of being arbitrary and overly specific. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 23:20, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

There are one or two editors who appear very keen to categorise by ethnicity. The person's surname looks like a Fooian surname so the person must be of Fooian descent, or the person's got black skin so they must be of Black African descent. Without an explicit source in the article, they should be removed. WP:BLP#Categories is quite clear on this: Category names do not carry disclaimers or modifiers, so the case for the category must be made clear by the article text. The article must state the facts that result in the use of the category tag and these facts must be sourced. cheers, Struway2 (talk) 09:07, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I don't think the categories need to be deleted, but agree that they should be removed from articles which don't have sourcing for them. Jogurney (talk) 13:54, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

The same could be said of religious orientation categories. Any footballer with Arabian type names gets included in Muslum categories, and I've seen several appear for Jewish and Catholic as well, without reference.--ClubOranje^T 23:48, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:BLP#Categories is even stronger on religious (and sexual) orientation. Apart from the bit quoted above, it also says that religious categories should not be used unless two criteria are met:

• The subject publicly self-identifies with the belief or orientation in question;
• The subject's beliefs or sexual orientation are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources.

cheers, Struway2 (talk) 09:09, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Template:Liverpool F.C. Reserves season 2008-09 game log

Can an admim speedily delete this abomination of a template please? Cheers, GiantSnowman 00:57, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately I can't think of a speedy crtierion it falls under, so it might have to go through TfD..... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:57, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. If it was an article, there is a category for blank articles, but for templates there are only T2 & T3, neither of which are applicable for this. - fchd (talk) 08:08, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Nominated TfD.--ClubOranje^T 23:49, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Swedish footballers

I noticed someone moved Teddy Lucic's article too Teddy Lučić, now I've never seen those signs used, not by the national association, not by Elfsborg, not fifa nor uefa. And he pointed at Zlatan, who really should be at Ibrahimovic per inter, MFF (click on the 2000-2010), the national association, skysports and fifa. There are probably more reason why these Swedish footballers should be at their common names. ch¹⁰ · 10:09, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I can agree with you, but please note that lazy journalists and webmasters aren't a good source for things like diacritics (90% of them don't even know what they are...). It would be interesting to know if in Sweden diacritics are permitted at birth or not (like here in Italy or in Canada). --necronudist (talk) 16:28, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

And please note that "Ibrahimovic" wears Ibrahimović on the back of his shirts... --necronudist (talk) 16:30, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I stumbled across one wikiproject the other week whose MOS was not to have diacritics full stop. I vaguely recall it was either American Football or Ice Hockey or something like that but can't find it now. Peanut4 (talk) 16:31, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

It was Ice Hockey (I stumbled there, too) 'cause it's mainly a NA sport, where diacritics aren't used (also at birth). --necronudist (talk) 16:34, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I dont think the c is allowed, you can't even do it on a Swedish keyboard, it just becomes "´c" as oppose to the é which is commonly used for "long e" and ü ("German y") are the only letters I know of that is "allowed" to have, which is used and shown on SvFF[3]'s player pages for example. ch¹⁰ · 16:47, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

There seems to be a bit about it on Swedish alphabet, "For Swedish native personal names, "ü" and "è" and others are also used. For foreign names, "ç", "ë", "í", "õ", "ñ" and many others might be used, but usually only "e", "i", "o" etc." and "The national population register can only use the letters A-Z,Å,Ä,Ö,Ü,É,ç and maybe a few others, so immigrants with other Latin letters in their names will have the diacritic marks stripped." I am very sceptic about the "ç" being allowed, it was added on it's own by a ip editor [4]. I think A-Ö,Ü,É is the more probable and my experience ch¹⁰ · 16:55, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

That's interesting. So he wasn't born Ibrahimović, but he wears in on his shirts... now it's only a matter of what a "common name" is. And however, as I always remember, if the article will be renamed without diacritics the original/heritage surname should be mentioned somewhere in the article. --necronudist (talk) 17:47, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

This player wears Lučić on his Sweden shirts - e.g. [5] The Hack 08:18, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Might not matter, firstly [6] without is used later, and if you're not even allowed to be have a name with č or ć plus that he's common name in English media (and Swedish) is "Lucic" ch¹⁰ · 08:26, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Do Swedish clubs even wear names on their playing shirts?The Hack 08:32, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not really that bothered either way. I'm probably more perplexed by some of these names.The Hack 08:40, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes some or most clubs wear names on the shirt, Elfsborg is one of them. and that picture is of his shirt. ch¹⁰ · 08:43, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I did a quick google image search and kept coming up with pictures of Elfsborg in the national league with just sponsor logos on the back[7][8]. But I don't get to watch much Swedish football, so you're probably right...The Hack 08:52, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmm looks like they might have changed to use sponsors there instead now in that case ch¹⁰ · 09:04, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

I think it's important to point out one thing here - this issue is not so much to do with Swedish Footballers, but rather the surnames of footballers in Sweden who are from the Balkans or in this case have Balkan heritage.. Lučićis the correct spelling in the Balkans. Bearded Avenger (talk) 12:26, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Sure, his original surname is Lučić, but he was born in Sweden... and if in Sweden registrs č and ć are not permitted... then he was born Lucic. --necronudist (talk) 12:33, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I have tried to find stuff about it at Skatteverket (Swedish Tax Agency) which controls the registering of people as far as I'm aware, but I've not found anything on letters. Though I did find a blogpost discussing the issue [9], ofc not a RS, but still indicating that there are only the é´à ü and the danish/norwerian ä... But then I thought... there is this site where you can search for people in Sweden, so I tried to search for "Teddy Lucic", that birthday is the same as on his article. Now if you try to search with "ć" or "č" you get a Server Error in '/' Application. Runtime Error, thought this can just mean that they can't handle those signs have have stripped them. Though searching with "Ø", "Ü" and "Æ" gives hits, but I couldn't find anyone with a Æ or Ø... A little OR perhaps... But I get the feeling his registered name is Lucic ch¹⁰ · 13:22, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

As a contrast I tried to search for a player who was born in Yugoslavia Bojan Djordjic who actually has his Swedish article at Bojan Đorđić for some reason, but those signs weren't possible to search and he was located at "Bojan Djordjic", so that might indicate that they strip letters, and ... what's the phrase, "Swedisize"(?) the names... But personally I've never seen Djordjic being called anything but Djordjic, Not Dordic or Djordic etc. so perhaps when his family moved here they (re-)register their names as "Djordjic" ch¹⁰ · 13:35, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, that's what happens usually. Pretty sad... Here in Italy is the same. --necronudist (talk) 14:02, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Just out of interest - how is Teddy's surname pronounced in Sweden?The Hack 14:18, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the most common is like this (at timecode 0:40), but I've also heard people say it like "Luke" + "itch" ch¹⁰ · 14:59, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Spam

It appears someone from Virgin Media is determined to get as many of their links as possible into Wikipedia articles. Steven.javorsky (talk • contribs • logs) and 212.188.188.18 (talk • contribs • logs) have both been at it. Is there a quick way for an admin to revert all of a user's recent edits? I'm getting fed up with reverting them all one by one. — Gasheadsteve ^{Talk to me} 15:00, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Seeing as you'd already warned the IP user why their links were being removed, I've rolled back the remainder of them. Rollback doesn't give an explicit edit summary, so I wouldn't have done it without a prior warning/explanation, as it's only supposed to be used for blatantly unproductive edits. cheers, Struway2 (talk) 15:15, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

The IP has responded, below is a copy of the response and my reply. Unfortunately I a bit hurried at the moment, can someone keep an eye out for any further response?: Oldelpaso (talk) 18:13, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

From the Virgin Media 'spammer' - I am providing links to free highlights to combat the posting of matches on YouTube and other sites that host material that violates rights agreements. We have the backing of the FA on this. By giving Wiki users an alternative we hope to combat them. We hope we have your support on this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.188.188.18 (talk) 16:51, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

With regards to links to Youtube etc. it is Wikipedia policy to remove any links to copyright violating material on sight; none ought to be present. In terms of the links you have been adding, there is a distinct commercial interest to your additions. Since legitimate highlights packages are available from multiple providers, e.g. club websites, BT Vision, there is no compelling reason why all English club pages should link to Virgin Media over any other. (note: while my reply here is made in my capacity as one of Wikipedia's administrators, as a volunteer my actions do not imply endorsement by the Wikimedia Foundation) Oldelpaso (talk) 18:10, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

rollback

Can someone rollback these bad stat edits? Thanks. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 08:07, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

What bad stat edits.....? -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 08:11, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Darlington #19

The fantastically updated Darlington FC website lists three players all wearing the #19 shirt - does anyone know who is the correct bearer of that particular number? GiantSnowman 20:21, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

The equally reliable Soccerbase lists three players (Barnes, Hardman and Tremarco) as wearing the #19 jersey for Darlington, so no help there. Equally, footballsquads.co.uk lists two players (Tremarco and Hardman) as having worn that shirt this season. Oh dear. – PeeJay 20:30, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

It cant be Tremarco because his loan spell is over as he played for the Wrexham reserve side today [10]. Kosack (talk) 20:51, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Footballsquads.co.uk lists both Hardman and Tremarco as "Players no longer at this club", so its possible they were registered with the number at different times - Hardman at the start of the season, Tremarco then on loan and finally Corey Barnes if Tremarco has gone back to Wrexham. Can't find any evidence though. Though Soccerbase lists Hardman as never played a game - contrary to his article. --Eastlygod (talk) 20:54, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

As far as I'm aware Corey Barnes wore #19 last night. Peanut4 (talk) 20:59, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Corey Barnes did wear number 19 last night, as per the BBC. Tremarco is no longer at the club, so the number was free. So that just leaves Hardman, is he still playing for Darlington? If he was released before Tremarco arrived, it would clear some confusion... --Eastlygod (talk) 21:04, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

According to Soccerbase, Hardman has never played a first team game for Darlington (although his WP article disagrees, I've just noticed), so maybe they allocated him the number at the start of the season, then gave it to someone else when it became clear he wasn't going to be selected for the firsts....? -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 21:07, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Hardman has played at least one game. As far as I can work out, he is still at the club but my guess is numebr 19 is his old number. Peanut4 (talk) 21:12, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

(ec) Darlo's own site says Hardman made one sub appearance in 2006-07, so presumably the ever-reliable Soccerbase is wrong again. Good job I hadn't hit save on the edit to add the AfD template to his article..... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 21:14, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Here is says he went out on loan to Bishop Auckland in September this season. This would have freed up his registered 19 number for Tremarco, and I presume if he plays again this season, he will be given a new number. Registered numbers can only be transferred if the player leaves the club. --Eastlygod (talk) 21:17, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

He has two soccerbase profile pages. Peanut4 (talk) 21:18, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Good old SB :-) Anyway, at the risk of this rambling completely off into a discussion of the glittering career of Lewis Hardman, it seems he is still on loan at Bishop Auckland as he played for them on 21 February, so I doubt he'll be attempting to reclaim the number 19 shirt this season...... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 21:21, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

To further add to the discussion of the glittering career of Lewis Hardman (sorry :D) - according to this Bishop Auckland fan site (look at the stats-pen picks section) he signed for the club after a loan spell, so he's not at Darlington anymore at all... Eastlygod (talk) 21:35, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

If that's an actual picture of him then he must be the only player shorter than Andy Hessenthaler..... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 21:41, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, he was released by Darlo in January. I've updated his bio appropriately. Peanut4 (talk) 22:03, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Terry Cooke

Use of the England flag in the infobox: good or not? – PeeJay 09:40, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I can't see any other instances of it being used in this way. However, WP:MOSICON says "Here, a single flag icon might be appropriate, e.g. next to the national team the article subject played for", so strictly speaking there's nowt wrong with it. Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 10:52, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, OK. It's just that I was under the impression that this WikiProject did not endorse the use of any flagicons in biography infoboxes. – PeeJay 10:54, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Oh dear, why do I get the impression I've just re-opened a Pandora's Box? :P Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 11:10, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

As with other biographical articles, flags are discouraged in sportspeople's individual infoboxes. - you can't get more specific and directly relevant than that. Pandora's box was nailed shut by this guideline. Knepflerle (talk) 11:31, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

A self-contradicting guideline? Oh dear - this needs to be flagged up on its talkpage. As far as Terry Cooke's infobox is concerned, I'd now say take the flag out (if it hasn't been already). Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 11:47, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Flags in infoboxes are a big no-no; partly because of ambiguity, and partly because they don't line up properly in some browsers. GiantSnowman 13:07, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

The new infobox resolves the alignment issue, however. ArtVandelay13 (talk) 14:50, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

And just for the record the guideline is not contradictory: You can discourage something while still allowing a few poignant exceptions. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 13:22, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I raised the issue at the talk page and the "Here, a single flag icon might be appropriate..." part has now been removed. Hopefully Pandora's Box has not only been nailed shut but is now buried under a copious amount of concrete! Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 14:31, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

There's far too much use of flags as far as I'm concerned. I don't see what benefit they have in a lot of places particularly in infoboxes. Peanut4 (talk) 18:53, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

This was part of the conversation I had with PeeJay2K3 about this: "I'm 99.999% certain that the discussion (here) only related to having flags next to, say, the country where players are born, or next to the name of the domestic club. In that circumstance, I absolutely agree - it messes with row alignment and looks awful. However, for national teams, I don't think it applies. WP:MOSFLAG clearly states that flags should not be used to designate places of birth/death - and I fully agree. However, the fact that the fb tag actively includes a flag in the syntax doesn't go against the flags guidelines; the only reason I was putting one on Terry Cooke's page is because there is no fb tag for England U21's, so I added the flag manually to be consistent". Thoughts? --JonBroxton (talk) 23:23, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

KNVB-Beker and Eredivisie relegation

Me and a friend were discussing this elsewhere, and I wonder if someone could provide me with an answer. There was, last season, the debate in the English leagues about whether a Football League Championship side could qualify for Europe despite being in the second tier.

Say FC Volendam, who beat Roda JC in extra time yesterday evening, not only win the competition, but also get relegated from the Eredivisie, would they still be allowed to qualify for Europe, as KNVB-Beker winners ordinarily enter into the following season's UEFA Cup?

Any response, or precedent, would be useful. Thank you. Bobo. 01:16, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Millwall, then in the Championship, qualified for the UEFA Cup a few years ago when they lost the FA Cup Final to Manchester United. Peanut4 (talk) 01:30, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Also Queen of the South, despite losing the Scottish Cup Final and being in the second tier of Scottish football, qualified for the UEFA cup due to the team that beat them - Rangers - already qualifying for the Champions League. So, yes, a second tier can qualify for Europe if they win the cup. --JonBroxton (talk) 01:41, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Awesome. Thank you for clarifying what I was intending to remember, Peanut, and thank you, Jon, for that interesting example, which I had completely forgotten about.

From what I've found, Queen of the South entered the second qualifying round of the UEFA Cup? Bobo. 01:46, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

As a note on that, 1. FC Union Berlin qualified for the UEFA Cup as a third division side in 2001, having lost the German Cup final to Schalke. To which division a club belongs to does not seem to make a difference at all then. EA210269 (talk) 09:26, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Further aside - the debate last year was about Cardiff, the issue being that they are a Welsh club and it was not clear whether UEFA would allow a Welsh club to enter Europe via an English competition. Madcynic (talk) 11:40, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Indeed - there was no debate about whether or not a Championship side could qualify, as that's a given. The debate was over whether or not a team which plays its league football outside its own country could qualify to represent the country in which it plays -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 11:46, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

This has happened before in the Netherlands. NEC were relegated from the Eredivisie in 1982-83, but they did reach the KNVB Cup Final. Because the cup was won by champions Ajax, NEC qualified for the European Cup Winners' Cup 1983–84. So yes, the KNVB Cup winner qualifies for the UEFA Cup/Europa League, regardless of the domestic league they play in. Aecis·(away) ^talk 12:50, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Amsterdam ArenA

I think the article should be moved to Amsterdam Arena. It was suggested years ago but none really seemed to be interested. What do others think? Sillyfolkboy (talk) 01:24, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I'd say no, per for example this, I think ArenA is both the common name and official name= ch¹⁰ · 01:53, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The BBC is throwing up mixed results. Similarly, the arena's website and the ajax website contradict each other in use. I thought Wikipedia generally avoid capitalisations used for stylistic effect? Though I can't remember any specific guidelines... Sillyfolkboy (talk) 03:04, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:Manual of Style (capital letters)#Mixed or non-capitalization says:

"For trademarks that are given in mixed or non-capitalization by their owners (such as adidas), follow standard English text formatting and capitalization rules."

Does this apply here? Beve (talk) 15:08, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I dont know, there are inconsistencies, iPod and all Apples iXyz stuff seems to be located per trademark (two I can think of that used to be but are not anymore are adidas and blink-182), eMusic, reddit and YouTube are, I guess others... ch¹⁰ · 15:14, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The MOS specifically makes exceptions for trademarks like eBay and iPod where the first letter is lowercase and the second letter is capitalised. Beve (talk) 15:19, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

FB template

Carrying on from the above flag-in-infobox discussion, what are people's views on using the {{fb}} templates for the national team in player's infoboxes? GiantSnowman 02:51, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, as you know, I quite like it, firstly because it makes linking to national team articles much easier without having to remember long-ass link names, and it makes coding of the infobox much neater. As for the flag issue, WP:MOSFLAG states that flags should not be used to identify places of birth/death, and it has already been agreed that using flags next to club names messes up the line heights and makes infoboxes look awful, so I 100% agree with not using them in those instances. However, I personally think that having the flag included in the {{fb}} template look fine; it doesn't contravene MOSFLAG, and doesn't mess with the line formatting, and adds one useful graphical element to the box. --JonBroxton (talk) 03:02, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I'd rather not have it, I mean it would clash with no flag for the clubs? I also think it's the easy way out rather than having to decide which flag variants should be used, for lets say Spanish footballers etc who have played under, let's say both and ch¹⁰ · 03:13, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree that it works well with a national team. Particularly as the teams tend to play in colours related to their national flags. Also agreed that birth/death/club usage is wholly unnecessary and open to all sorts of conflict. Flag use for a national team is almost always unambiguous. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 03:16, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I don't particularly like the fb templates. I don't see why we need them when the link is easy to add. It seems lazy and if flags are used it can lead to problems since flags change. Peanut4 (talk) 18:22, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

If the typing difficulty of the link is a difficulty (or if, like me, you are lazy and/or a two-finger typist), there is always the nft template. I'd go for leaving infoboxes flag-free. Kevin McE (talk) 09:37, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I've never seen a more usable template when it comes to World Cup articles, to Copa America, the Euros etc. Flags are not changing often, and if a country changes flags the historical flags will be put into the template, probably with the possibility to run a bot or something to fix all the places which calls for a historical flag ch¹⁰ · 09:43, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Flags are not supposed to be used decoratively, adding the flag next to the name of the country seems like a perfect example of decorative flag use. King of the North East 19:02, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

UEFA Europa League 2009–10

Should Manchester United be placed on UEFA Europa League 2009–10? I think it's crystal balling. Kingjeff (talk) 04:16, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Talk:UEFA Europa League 2009–10#Listing teams for the discussion. ch¹⁰ · 04:19, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

They are qualified for certain to this and only this competition as of the moment. If/When they clinch 5th place or better in the Premier League (or win the FA Cup and clinch 6th, though by that time the season will be over) they will play in this tournament next season, using this berth. Seems straightforward enough to me. -- Grant.Alpaugh 04:20, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

As I mentioned on the talk page Chandler listed above, they are not qualified for certain for this competition. They can still qualify for UEFA Champions League 2009-10 which would nullify their position that you claim they have. Kingjeff (talk) 04:24, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

The notion that they will qualify for the Champions League is crystal balling. They are guaranteed to qualify for this competition. They don't have to play another football match for the rest of the season, let alone win one, and they will play in this tournament next year. If/When that changes, we will update the appropriate articles. -- Grant.Alpaugh 04:34, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

They are qualified but not guaranteed to play and take that spot in the competition, as has been said that is crystal balling as well. I believe the information should be removed from the article until it is confirmed that they will actually take the spot and compete. Camw (talk) 10:15, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I never said that they would. In fact, I said that both were crystal balling. Kingjeff (talk) 04:46, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Can a qualifier like "Subject to Premier League final standings" be put next to Man U in the list?The Hack 10:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

It should just be made clear that they are eligible to take part (and why). Whether they make use of their eligibility and actually participate is neither confirmed, nor even "expected" (the unsourced and incorrect wording used on the page) - it is just possible. Knepflerle (talk) 10:17, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• The problem seems to centre on the wording "The following 30 teams are expected to participate in the third qualifying round", as things stand I don't think anyone "expects" Man Utd to be in the competition (at least, not at the 3QR stage). The wording could be changed to something like "The following 30 teams will be eligible to enter at the third qualifying round" or something, but even then a disclaimer needs to be added against Man Utd and any other teams involved that may yet qualify for the Champions League -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 10:20, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• I'd strip the list of teams out altoghether for now. No teams are in the competition until they are nominated by their national association anyway. - fchd (talk) 10:57, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I think including Manchester United on this article is completely pointless. Really, what do we gain by saying this? Sillyfolkboy (talk) 11:01, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• sigh* (sarcasm on) Where have you seen those lines before: "This article contains information about a future UEFA Europa League season, and is likely to contain information of a speculative nature. The content may change as the event approaches and more information becomes available." I'm just sayin'... (sarcasm off)

Seriously, just change the "are expected to compete" to "are eligible to compete" and put a note to the Manchester United entry (see Talk:UEFA Europa League 2009–10 for details). And by the way, this debate on marginalia wouldn't have come up if the club in question would have been FC Dinamo Tbilisi or OFC Sliven 2000 instead of Manchester United... --Soccer-holic (talk) 11:29, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

No Wikipedia should contain "information of a speculative nature". - fchd (talk) 11:42, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

How about just putting English team. It has already been confirmed that there will be an English team in the league.The Hack 11:51, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I've left Manchester United in, but added the following note as suggested by Soccer-holic on the article talk page :-

Note 1: The spot will be transferred to the 6th-placed team of Premier League 2008–09 if Manchester United qualify for the UEFA Champions League 2009–10 via their league place.

That should clear up most confusion/arguments. --Eastlygod (talk) 13:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

That note is not entirely correct. Manchester United could finish 5th and qualify for the Europa League directly via the Premier League. In that case they would qualify for the play-off round, and someone else would get the berth in the third round. This caveat remains true for all cupwinners, and doesn't need the competition to be over for the caveat to apply for the berth. Something that applies for 50+ clubs, certainly isn't worth noting. It is well known that if a club qualifies for a competition through more than one rout, or qualifies for more than one competition, they will abdicate some of their berths to other clubs. I don't see why since this applies to Manchester United everyone is all in a huff about it. There is nothing wrong with simply saying that they are eligable for the Europa League, as the truth of that statement stays in tact whether Manchester United win or lose every game they play for the rest of the season. -- Grant.Alpaugh 00:06, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

"Something that applies for 50+ clubs, certainly isn't worth noting." - no, it's something that obviously needs clarifying. Until the main text of the article is changed, a qualifyier for even just one case is better than the misleading absence on all of them. Knepflerle (talk) 22:37, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

There's a note at the top of the page; "This article contains information about a future UEFA Europa League season, and is likely to contain information of a speculative nature. The content may change as the event approaches and more information becomes available." That amply states that the info may change as the competition gets nearer. Peanut4 (talk) 22:39, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

And the footnote explains how it may change, which the general boilerplate notice does not. Knepflerle (talk) 22:46, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Trialists

As a labour of love I have been updating the squads for Finnish football teams. I have been adding trailists in order to make Wikipedia as relevant as possible, but some dude keeps deleting them. Is this a general rule? From my perspective Wikipedia is not a book that can only be revised on re-printing and therefore including trialists is a benefit of this.

Additionally, if general trialists should not be included, what about trialists who have been given squad numbers? Bearded Avenger (talk) 12:31, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Triallists by definition aren't actually on the club's books, so there's no reason to include them. At Gillingham we seem to have triallists playing in the reserves every other week, none of them ever seem to be kept on and generally they disappear into obscurity -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 12:33, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like there's some latitude for common sense here. A player with a dedicated squad number is unlikely to be a triallist in the sense that ChrisTheDude understands you to mean. He is more likely to be on something like a rolling weekly contract (ie being paid on a match-by-match basis) without tenure, while the club considers signing a more substantial deal. In this case, the club would presumably be in possession of the player's registration, and although his position would be precarious, he would be as much a registered player as someone on a five-year contract. If you can establish that this is the case, then there's no more reason to leave that player off the list than any other. If loan players are to be listed (which they are with many clubs), then short-contract players are at least as valid.

However, in the circumstances suggested by CTD, where a player is given a run-out in the reserves or a pre-season friendly, there is no formal club attachment. (I once saw an inmate from HMP with two warders in attendance playing for Watford in a friendly). Such players cannot be regarded as notable enough for inclusion. In the very rare case of a genuinely notable player being a triallist (for example, a former international trying to prove that there's one last season in his old legs), this would surely be worth a couple of sentences at the end of the main article, rather than an unremarked addition to the squad list.

So I think you need to establish what kind of 'triallists' they are, and then sort the wheat from the chaff. Does that make sense? Grubstreet (talk) 04:58, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I would dispute that any player having a trial with a club, even an ex-international, merits a mention on the club's article. Given that most club articles cover up to 120 years of history in four or five paragraphs, it would be insane recentism to tack "Former England international Fred Bloggs is currently having a trial with the club" -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 17:19, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Polish Ekstraklasa

The article is very bad i must say, for such a big league. I'd understand this kind of quality of an article for the Belarussian league or something. Is anyone interested in updating the page?

Link to page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekstraklasa thelastone36 (talk) 15:16, 6 March 2009 (UTC)(edit, sorry for the bad placement, fixed)

Tommy Lowry

I haven't had any reply to my query at Talk:Crewe Alexandra F.C.#Tommy Lowry so I am seeking a wider input, here, please? If I can get a reliable source I'm intending to start a page on him. Smile a While (talk) 22:45, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Answer to query - he played 436 League games and 482 altogether including Cup matches (Source - www.allfootballers.com). Daemonic Kangaroo (talk) 22:54, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. Smile a While (talk) 00:43, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

The Post War English & Scottish Football League A - Z Player's Database confirms 436 league apps, with 2 goals. The same website also has his Liverpool stats - just the one league appearance, no goals. Hope this helps! GiantSnowman 12:11, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Category:Italian British footballers

Based on this CFD, this category should be deleted as well, correct? Hubschrauber729 (talk) 01:58, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I would say so, yes. A person's ethnicity has nothing to do with their career. – PeeJay 04:01, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Team are defending champions (infobox vandalism)

(Just adding two old discussions here) Football clubs - singular or plural?, Mass grammar change on team articles

{{Infobox football league season}}, {{Infobox football league}}, {{Infobox football tournament}} are currently being edited to say "Current champion" instead of "Current champions", which how I see it is wrong. Man United are the defending champions of the Champions League. Real Madrid are the current champions of La Liga... I remember a quote from the 2005 final "Liverpool are champions of Europe again" if we'd compare that to "On Wednesday Inter go to Old Trafford to face defending champion Manchester United". Some help needed ch¹⁰ · 03:44, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

At minimum, the numbers (ie singular v plural considerations) must agree. So it has to be either 'ClubX is champion' or 'ClubX are champions'. To say 'are champion' is illiterate unless intended as northern English dialect for 'are brilliant' (and that is not the context here). It is usual to consider a club, in its team sense, as plural, eg 'Charlton are not scoring enough goals'. The singular is used much more rarely, usually when considering the club as a business entity. In other words, I agree with you: 'defending champions', plural. Grubstreet (talk) 04:11, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

It's American English versus British English again. And the Manual of Style explicitly says that one is not better than the other, and you shouldn't arbitrarily go changing articles (and presumably templates) "unless there are reasons for changing it based on strong national ties to the topic". Beve (talk) 04:26, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

And I think this has a pretty strong ties to British English, plus American teams that use these templates are called "Town Somethingers" and should be as Champions as well. ch¹⁰ · 04:32, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes and no, Beve. Even the WP article on differences between American and British English illustrates 'correct' usage with the example:

"BrE: Pittsburgh are the champions; AmE: Pittsburgh is the champion."'

so I stand by my suggestion that, at minumum, the numbers should agree. 'Is champion' or 'are champions'. But in any case, what I understand Chandler to be saying is that someone is going around changing 'champions' to 'champion', which is in contradiction to the 'not arbitrarily changing articles' guideline. Articles on English football clubs do not need to be Americanised, any more than articles on American baseball teams need to be Anglicised. Anyone who is doing that (in either direction) is on a mission to promote one culture over the other, which is surely not to be encouraged. Grubstreet (talk) 05:33, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

What I was referring to was the line under The Beatles are a well-known band; The Steelers are the champions., and therefore I would guess it should be "Champions: New York Red Bulls" for example ch¹⁰ · 05:47, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

You've both gone way over 3RR. I warned him, but if I warn him I have to warn you too - nothing personal. Beve (talk) 20:00, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

There's currently a discussion over at Template talk:Infobox football tournament about whether of not to americanise all football infoboxes (or at least these {{Infobox football league season}}, {{Infobox football league}}, {{Infobox football tournament}}) to make them (imo) incorrect in BrE, when there's probably not even a article that would need to use american, seeing as the MLS infobox doesn't even use the label proposed for change. ch¹⁰ · 05:44, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

We could do with a few more people joining the discussion. Beve (talk) 20:12, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Couldn't a flag (American=Yes/No) be added, which would then determine whether "Champions" or "Champion" is displayed? I'm sure the club box uses this to determine whether to display "ground" or "stadium" and such like..... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 08:28, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

One problem with that is there are even many American teams, let's say "New York Red Bulls" that would be Champions, plus the guy who want Champion want all Asian and South American articles changed to it, even when they're using Ground instead of stadium etc. ch¹⁰ · 08:37, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Let's end this

I'm beyond disappointed with the amount of edit warring this generated. It is trivial to solve this technically with a "US=yes" option in the infoboxen in question; let's go that route. I'll report the next person I see getting into a lame edit war like this myself. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:42, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Juan David Moreno

Is anyone knowledgeable about football in Colombia? The article Juan David Moreno has been recreated after being prodded as being unverifiable but I don't see any of the usual WP:FOOTBALL contributors in the history. Is anyone able to verify that this chap exists and has plays for Millonarios? --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 04:36, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

KOTNE is a bit of a whiz at South American football, he'll be able to help you out. GiantSnowman 12:13, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I have dropped him a line on his talk page.--Malcolmxl5 (talk) 15:52, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

No such player is with the club now, and I found no evidence that any such player was with the club in 2008. Looks like a hoax or a youth squad player. Jogurney (talk) 17:20, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I found this page which includes Juan David Moreno in the Medellín squad (in the grey box to the right). Other than trivial references like this linking him with the "wrong" club, I can find nothing. I'd say AfD it as unverifiable. King of the North East 19:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll give it a couple of weeks to give the author an opportunity to add sources before going to AfD. --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 02:22, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Help from a admin to revert multiple edits (concerning FC Barcelona changed to F.C.)

Love19886 (talk · contribs · count · logs · page moves · block log), has gone around and moved articles and re-made links etc from FC Barcelona to F.C. Barcelona... I've removed a few of them, but it's just overwhelming, is there perhaps possible for admins to do it easier? ch¹⁰ · 10:24, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

• I've fixed some more and deleted some of the pointless redirects - it's necessary to have F.C. Barcelona as a redirect to FC Barcelona, but we clearly didn't need F.C. Barcelona season 2006-07, for example. There's a lot more to fix, though, he appears to have done the same with Valencia as well. I'm out for the rest of the day, so someone might want to look at that... Black Kite 12:29, 7 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Actually, I think that's everything now - and I really am gone :) Black Kite 14:57, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Club notability in Wales

Overlooking the impressive number of spelling and grammar errors in a two-sentence article, are Acrefair Youth notable? They play in the Welsh National League (Wrexham Area), which is apparently at level 3 of the Welsh football league system........... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 20:51, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

I can't find anything that says that that is a professional league. Then again, because of the lack of coverage, I don't know. As only three other clubs in that league have articles, I'm guessing not notable. DeMoN2009 21:52, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

There is no requirement whatsoever for a club to play in a fully professional league. The accepted rule of thumb in England is that clubs down to the tenth level are OK, and at that level players aren't paid at all. I was just wondering if there were any views on where said rule of thumb might fall in Wales. If it's any help, clubs from their division do appear to be eligible to play in the Welsh Cup, although I can't find any record of this team having done so...... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 21:58, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

From the little I could find on the web, attendances at games in that league tend to be sub-100 (the only home attendance figure I could find for Acrefair Youth was 23), so the English equivalent would be somewhere down in the Level 10 and below area. Without a guideline, though, I guess we'd just have to stick to standard notability. Black Kite 01:45, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I've tided up and renamed the batch of articles created via the same account in the Wrexham Area League. Brickfield do enter the Welsh Cup, making the last 64 this year (after losing 12-0 in the first game last year), but I'd be hard pushed to find the necessary non-trivial third-party coverage in multiple reliable sources to satisfy general notability guidelines. - fchd (talk) 20:46, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Recent edits to the AFC Champions League 2009 article

I found that there is some controversial edits by consensus in the article. Due to editing by "non-consensus" - ignoring the against voices, those edits could be regarded as vandalism. The editors edited the group stage table in the following format:

Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts Ulsan Hyundai 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Newcastle Jets 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Beijing Guoan 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Nagoya Grampus 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Ulsan Hyundai – – – Newcastle Jets – – – Beijing Guoan – – – Nagoya Grampus – – –

I strongly disagree to the edits with the flag included because the table let me uneasy that the football teams are going to have a war with the armies of the countries as listed in the fixture table. Raymond Giggs 04:41, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree with you. The flags in the top row of the results table should be replaced by an appropriate three-letter code for each team. Otherwise it implies that the national teams are getting involved, IMO. – PeeJay 11:20, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

More importantly, what would happen if teams from the same country play against one another in later stages? matt91486 (talk) 11:57, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree with all of the above. I think the format used for UEFA Champions League 2008-09#Group A etc, are much better. No need for the flags in the resultbox ch¹⁰ · 12:35, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Hey man, what the signature is it? I failed to identify you! Raymond Giggs 13:47, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Ah ha! Do you know what Mousega, who strongly encourage that edit, said? He said it will not happen under the current rule! Okay, he's right. But should he refer to the other articles with the same format, i.e. UEFA and CONCACAF Champions Leagues, and the other competitions, UEFA Cup, AFC Cup, or the others? Did we do that? I am almost blow up my emotion when seeing those words. I don't think that edit is so special. If he think that is a very special format, why don't he change into that format at the other championship? Well? Raymond Giggs 13:47, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

There is absolutely no reason for any team on that article to be assigned a flag more than once. Every additional instance of a flag should be removed. This applies to every other international club tournament too. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 08:56, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely! I reverted for many times but they keep revert back again. So I failed to do anything. Please help for the problem. Raymond Giggs 14:43, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Mousega appears to be the only one arguing to keep all the flags. There's consensus on the talk page that they're flagcruft. If he continues to edit war against consensus, that can be dealt with. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 17:38, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Infobox vandal

Teammates, VASCO here,

Sincerely, what is wrong with this user and his endless IP (in the utmost literal sense - see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Suspected_Wikipedia_sockpuppets_of_Bruno_P._Dori)?

First, let me do a situation checkup: he solely operates on FC Barcelona players, past or present, and also only "contributes" to infoboxes. His first account was Bruno P.Dori, which was indef blocked after several warnings (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Bruno_P._Dori). Now for the deeds: he started with the youth sections, writing the redundant FC BARCELONA YOUTH, when it's already implied in said section. Then, it was player positions...

I'll provide two examples, one of gross infobox misusage and one of misleading the audience (while enlarging box, providing false info): in Oscar López Hernández, he wrote RIGHT BACK/LEFT BACK/CENTRE BACK, when all it took was DEFENDER. I tried for a solution, adding DEFENDER in box then elaborating in introduction to story, sent him a message (after all those unheeded warnings, i thought, maybe, since he operates from Brazil, he did not understand English, so i wrote him in his(?) and mine mothertongue, Portuguese), and he immediately popped out a new anon IP and reverted, without any conversation whatsoever.

2nd: in Roger García Junyent, he wrote CENTRE MIDFIELDER / LEFT BACK in the position, a downright lie. I remember his playing days with BARCELONA, alongside brother Óscar, and he was never a central midfielder, and very very rarely a left back, only in an emergency (too many injuries, or placed there for a left back when team was trailing). The examples to this behaviour are like his IP, endless, and now he seems to have taken a shine (always in infobox) to enlarging information in birthplace, and no one can dare to correct it, it can/will be reverted on sight.

An important "closer": both main accounts and the IP army write no edit summaries (zero), and have engaged in no talkpage forums nor responded to any messages, also engaging in endless edit wars.

Attentively, i "pass the ball",

VASCO AMARAL - --NothingButAGoodNothing (talk) 13:55, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

• Sorry for the incovenience of reporting this, at least someone could have had the courtesy to point out what i did wrong. Good week, people,

VASCO AMARAL - --NothingButAGoodNothing (talk) 18:55, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

• On the other hand, good news: User BRUNINHO has responded to his first message, he is willing to collaborate on a good basis, wonderful...I have responded to him, everything arranged now.

Ty for your time, VASCO AMARAL - --NothingButAGoodNothing (talk) 23:55, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

English football league system#Cup eligibility

An IP has felt the need to copy into this section the entire list of round exemptions for the FA Cup. I remove it as too detailed for the article in question, but it was put straight back in - what do others think? I notice that the IP hasn't bothered to add in the equivalent level of detail for the other cups mentioned in the section...... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 08:25, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Take it to the article talk. FWIW I think this should be left to the FA Cup article. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 08:48, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

UEFA five-star / Elite status

So a while back user:Hippo43 decided that because the old 5-star classification for Europe's elite stadia had been superseded by the Elite classification, he'd start removing any mention of it from current articles. This has come to a head with {{UEFAEliteStadia}}, formerly {{UEFA5Star}}, which Hippo has been repeatedly blanking recently to get his point across. I've raised discussion here about including both Elite and 5-star stadia here, as (a) it means the template isn't useless for now, (b) we have much better sourcing on the 5-stars and (c) the changing criteria do not necessarily mean that the old material should be discarded - we don't treat the various European Cup formats as separate tournaments even though the format and criteria have changed wildly over the years, for instance. Comments welcome. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 14:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I've replied to Chris' comments at the template talk page. However, he is wrong to claim that I have blanked the template - I simply removed the unsourced list which was there under the heading 'UEFA Elite Stadium', and it hasn't been to make a point, any more than any other edit is to make the editor's point. As far as I can tell, the heading was changed from 5-star to Elite by him - I can't see any reason to include 5-star stadia under the title 'Elite stadia'. I don't see the template as 'useless' without a list. On the other hand, it strikes me as worse than useless if it includes an out of date list, or speculation about Elite stadia.

I am in favour of including sourced examples in two separate templates (or more, if templates are needed for the lower classifications), so long as the 5-star template makes it clear that the rating is obsolete. --hippo43 (talk) 15:00, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Isn't the Elite stadium rating more lax than the 5 star rating, therefore allowing in all 5 stared? chandler · 15:09, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

To assume that would be original research (or synthesis?). As I understand it, though I may be wrong, stadia are onyl Elite if they are assessed as such by UEFA. --hippo43 (talk) 15:14, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that we haven't actually been able to find a single secondary source which confirms this - Hippo is right to suggest that we cannot simply read UEFA's classification paper and decide for ourselves which stadia are Elite or not, but that leaves us with almost no sources to confirm that a stadium is Elite. By contrast, the five-star qualification is well-sourced. While it may be obsolete (note: may be obsolete; it is still the criterion on which the venues for this year's finals were selected), it should not be discarded entirely as it has a valuable historical purpose. I rather think that while we have no hard figures on whether many verified 5-stars are verified Elites that we should use one template for both. The issue here is not that the classifications are likely to be false (they've been vetted by the Project) but that we just can't find good sources for them right now. That certainly doesn't compel them to be removed. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:17, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

You're right, it doesn't compel them to be removed, but they can't be misrepresented as one and the same. The fact that it is difficult to find sources for this doesn't exempt it from verifiability. I'm not denying the historical relevance, just the assumption and representation of equivalence between Elite & 5-star, given the replacement of the 4/5-star system with 1/2/3/Elite. The answer for me is two templates - 'Elite stadia' and 'Former 5-star stadia', both only including examples if they are referenced. --hippo43 (talk) 15:33, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

This all seems to be predicated on the idea that it is impossible to find a source which says "Elite is the replacement for 5-star". It is illogical to me to have to maintain two separate templates for qualifications which are functionally equivalent (they both permit stadia to host UEFA club finals). But if that's what it comes down to, the recent changes to the five-star template should be reverted and a new template started for Elite. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:41, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem for me is that they are not functionally equivalent. According to UEFA's paper, only stadia assessed as Elite are able to host a European final. So not stadia which were previously assessed as 5-star.

I've created the template Template:FormerUEFA5StarStadia, preserving the info from immediately before Chris changed the header - seems useful to me, and quicker than renaming and writing a new Elite template. My opinion is that the historical rating really belongs in the article body - a list of stadia which used to be 5-star is not particularly useful, but I'm happy to see this template or similar used if that is what others want. Comments welcome. --hippo43 (talk) 15:50, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I would propose one template for all UEFA standards, have the new current ones on the top (the one sourced etc), and under that something like "defunct ratings" with a note on "these stadium's havent been ranked with the new ranking" chandler · 16:24, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

My concern with your suggestion would be that it would be a long list of defunct 4/5-star stadia, and a short list of 1/2/3/Elite stadia. If it even got close to having all examples of current & previous UEFA ranked stadia, it would be too big for me. --hippo43 (talk) 16:33, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Well I don't see any problem in that, we can change the layout to {{Navbox}} and keep it outside the fb-thingy. And I understand it would be mostly 4star/5star in the beginning, but I think a template that shows the full range of Stadiums according to rank would be a good template. chandler · 16:41, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

For me, it would be preferable to have a template/s attached to each article reflecting that particular stadium's current and former status, with a link to the main UEFA Stadium article, rather than one mega-list. --hippo43 (talk) 16:49, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Well right now I think just one link to the Bernabeu seems very misleading (if it's the only stadium ranked according to the new standard), not explaining the old system. chandler · 16:53, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Something like this would be the first draft chandler · 17:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

That looks good Chandler. Uncontroversial and historical, I'd suggest moving this into the main space immediately. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 00:38, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Looks better than I thought it would. However, we need to make it clear that this is not a complete list - having 'none' in various categories, and only one stadium in 'Elite', is a bit odd. Having this list in the template gives the impression that it is somehow authoritative and complete, and it will be misleading unless we make it clear. --hippo43 (talk) 01:11, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I've removed most of the '5-star' stadia from Template:UEFA5Star, as only Ibrox and Old Trafford were referenced in their articles/ Again, this will make the above list even less useful, as there are undoubtedly a lot more 5-star stadia than listed, but we can't just have a load of unreferenced examples in a template. --hippo43 (talk) 01:41, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't know if you deem this reliable but [11] I'm pretty sure all the stadiums were pretty known that it was correct, the differences from the Stadium Guide just talking about the 5 stars, Delle Alpi is not included on our template. Wembley, Allianz Arena, Olympic Stadium (Athens), Sükrü Saracoglu Stadium and HSH Nordbank Arena are on our template but not on the website... The first 3 are either former 5 star or Elite class just because of the fact that they're hosting a CL final (and the Olympic stadium just hosted one in 07). HSH Nordbank Arena can be found reference through google[12][13], at the least we know it's a 4 star stadium because it's hosting the 2010 EL final.. That could perhaps even indirectly reference it as a Elite stadium. If the Bernabeu was rated Elite to be able to host the 2010 final (and UEFA changing their rules to only Elite stadium can host CL and EL finals) all who host finals 2010 or later are a shoe in. Sükrü Saracoglu is at least a 4 star stadium because it's hosting this years UEFA Cup final, if the ratings changed for 2010? I can go through the 4 stars soon. (Reference that at least St. Jakob-Park is a 4 star) chandler · 08:33, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

UEFA can be gits when it comes to making the relevant information available. Emailing them for further information doesn't tend to make things much clearer (personally I think they often don't know what they are doing themselves). The star system is obsolete but there is little indication as to whether the old 4/5 star stadiums are now all classed as Elite. Via the means of original research I know that City of Manchester Stadium is a UEFA Elite Stadium, since a) it was chosen to host a UEFA Cup final after the system changed and b) an IP made an edit to that effect, which when I chased it up turned out to be by the groundsman there. But neither helps for citation purposes. Oldelpaso (talk) 10:01, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Agree that UEFA could solve all this by publishing lists, but we just can't go assuming that 'Stadium X is 5-star because it hosted/will host cup final Y' or that 'Stadium X is now Elite so it must have been 4/5-star'. We need sources which say so specifically. I'm not convinced that stadiumguide.com is a reliable source. --hippo43 (talk) 12:02, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

If UEFA have stated only Elite stadiums can host EL or CL finals I think its pretty easy - and what's the problem with stadiumguide? chandler · 12:06, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Inferring that 'UEFA have stated only Elite stadiums can host EL or CL finals, and Stadium X is to host final Y, therefore stadium X is 5-star/Elite' is synthesis, so not acceptable. It's fairly straight-forward - we need reliable sources which confirm each stadium's status. Stadiumguide doesn't look like a reliable source to me - it's not an academic source, or a mainstream news organisation etc. Looks like a personal website, and there's no indication where they get their information from. --hippo43 (talk) 12:26, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

(ec) The trouble with stadiumguide is that it doesn't particularly establish credentials which affirm reliability in the WP:RS sense. It doesn't state its sources or attribute authorship for instance. That and there are things on it which are out of date or just flat out wrong. To turn it on its head, what makes it reliable? User:Ealdgyth/FAC, Sources, and You is a useful read. Oldelpaso (talk) 12:40, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Well I'd say this is different from OR when it comes to. This is UEFA regulation, I would not say to far way from the situation at Adem Ljajić, where FIFA regulation clearly states one thing, basically that a u-18 Serb can't transfer to a English team. Therefore he couldn't be on loan at Partizan, it was eventually confirmd by Man Utd "He may not be able to join the club officially until next January". I see it similar here, UEFA regulation say "only Elite stadiums are allowed to host" and they announce a host... That's just following UEFA regulation... You don't think it would look strange if the article would say "only Elite stadiums can host finals" but we have Allianz Arena and Wembley listed as hosting but they're not Elite stadiums? chandler · 12:50, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

So the usual policies don't apply, and this is a special case? Not for me. --hippo43 (talk) 13:05, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I just don't agree that it falls under OR. This is not trying to get something that doesnt exist out of a news story, these are UEFA rules and regulations, if anything I think what's needed is to show a source stating that/why UEFA would have used exceptions from their own rules when it comes to hosting CL/EL finals. chandler · 13:26, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Have you read the policies? Which part do you disagree with? Noone is claiming UEFA have ignored their own rules, just that we need a proper source to say a stadium has classification X. This problem comes from some people wanting a template which lists all relevant stadiums by their ratings, when no such definitive list exists. Trying to create such a list based on supposition and implication is just not consistent with wp policy. --hippo43 (talk) 14:06, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Canadian soccer players with multiple nationalities

Yet another AfD which has had no input from any regular WP:FOOTBALL members...GiantSnowman 18:18, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Suggestions

Kind "teammates", i bring to you these 2 suggestions and/or doubts,

1: I am really at a loss with the use (proper or improper) of the letters FC or CD or several others in club names displayed in a player's article. According to the Manual of Style, which i recently browsed, i believe it asks for coherence to be kept, stating that, if a club is named in one way, it should be so for the remainder of the article. However, what are the infobox patterns? Do they equal those of storyline? Help, please :) !!

2: This is really a suggestion; recently this year, the category FOOTBALL (SOCCER) STRIKERS was merged into FORWARDS, encompassing all the more offensive players (strikers, centre forwards and forwards). However, i have been finding this situation in some articles: in some, we have FOOTBALL (SOCCER) DEFENDERS, in others FULLBACKS and still in others, the word CENTRAL DEFENDERS. Is there a possibility to merge all these into just DEFENDERS, so that, in the future, the categories would be GOALKEEPERS, DEFENDERS, MIDFIELDERS, WINGERS and FORWARDS?

Attentively, VASCO AMARAL - --NothingButAGoodNothing (talk) 21:18, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

1. Clubs should be known by their shortest common title after the lede of the article. In most cases this means no FC or CD or whatever. Any other clubs mentioned in the article should use the same format as the subject. I plan to readdress this in a new RfC based on #Naming conventions for clubs? soon.
2. Yes, the various positions should be merged. I'd go as far as to combine "wingers" and "midfielders" as well, as in the modern game there is often no distinction between the two. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 22:15, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

• Indeed Chris, good tip, merging WINGERS and MIDFIELDERS. Still a question, mate (about the FC and CD and akin): is the modus operandi valid for infoboxes as well? Ty very much. --NothingButAGoodNothing (talk) 22:27, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Surely you mean to link Wingers with Forwards? - fchd (talk) 22:35, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I my mind they're more midfielders than forwards, for me "winger" is equal to "outer midfielder", probably have with growing up in a 4-4-2 country, whereas someone grown up in a 4-3-3 country would probably think of them more as Forwards. chandler · 22:40, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Indeed. That's why I said "in the modern game". Certainly historically wingers were forwards, but I wouldn't describe Ryan Giggs as a forward even in his youth. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 22:54, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Good luck solving this debate! Beve (talk) 23:02, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree with thumperward. We should use the shortest common title after the lead of the article. There is no need to use the club's full name all the time. Example: there is no need to use "FC Barcelona" in the whole article, just "Barcelona" is enough. --Carioca (talk) 22:46, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

• Yes CARIOCA, i see your point. My question is: is it ok to write, for instance, and only in infobox, FC BARCELONA or SEVILLA FC (i especially embrace this reasoning when club names match that of city) then, in storyline, when needed only BARCELONA, SEVILLA? Answering RICHARD RUNDLE's doubt, no, i meant WINGERS and MIDFIELDERS, as FORWARDS are already merged with STRIKERS. Also, as CHANDLER aptly put it, a winger is a midfielder trying to get ahead (not a head :)) Cheers!! - --NothingButAGoodNothing (talk) 23:07, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Wingers=midfielders or wingers=forwards... All very well saying merge wingers into midfielders as "as in the modern game there is often no distinction between the two" but are we now only making articles for players who play the "modern game"? Do we really intend to redefine the careers of players of old?--ClubOranje^T 00:07, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

1. After the bolded full name in the intro and the fullname parameter in the infobox, I believe the common name should be used. King of the North East 00:12, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
2. categories for Goalkeepers, Defenders, Midfielders, Forwards and Wingers seem sufficient, I don't see any problem merging Central defenders and Defenders because a central defender is by definition a defender, Wingers is tricky because it would be misleading to categorise many wingers as either midfielder or forward so I think it should be kept. King of the North East 00:12, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

That the categories are merged does not preclude wingers-of-old from being recategorised as forwards rather than midfielders. It just means that in practical terms, we have less work to do by recategorising wingers as midfielders and then fixing those who aren't than the other way around. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 00:16, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Refereeing of References

Hi again! Here is another suggestion/doubt. I know this one is not exclusive to football, but to the entire Wiki; however, since User:Jaellee directed me to this forum page, here it goes:

Take this example, Francisco Copado: Why are the references in its original form, German? I always thought they should be in English (at this Wikipedia, of course), followed by the correspondent template. What are the patterns here, if any?

As far as the merging of all defensive players, i have already altered some.

Attentively, from Portugal - --NothingButAGoodNothing (talk) 00:59, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I've had similar problems with Spanish references. Editors seem keen to translate the titles and remove the original language. What they don't realise is that, once translated, if the link goes dead then finding the original article again is difficult, if not impossible. I prefer stating the English translation then having "the original title in brackets and italics" (el título original en paréntesis e itálicas). There appears to be no Wiki guideline on this matter. Sillyfolkboy (talk) 01:08, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

We do have a guideline on it, which is "If quoting from a different language source, an English translation should be given with the original-language quote beside it." --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 02:18, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

From WP:VUE - Non-English sources

"Because this is the English Wikipedia, for the convenience of our readers, editors should use English-language sources in preference to sources in other languages, assuming the availability of an English-language source of equal quality, so that readers can easily verify that the source material has been used correctly. Where editors translate any direct quote, they should quote the relevant portion of the original, non-English text in a footnote or in the article. Translations published by reliable sources are preferred over translations made by Wikipedia editors."

Overall - use the best-quality source you can, but if quality is equal pick the English-language one. Knepflerle (talk) 10:31, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Does this guideline suggest that referenced article titles should not be translated from another language to English? It only mentions translating direct quotes from the source either in a footnote or the body of the article - not the title of the published work. Jogurney (talk) 13:06, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

There is no need to translate the title, and the original language one should certainly be provided (as it's the original source), but an additional translation wouldn't hurt. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:28, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Alleged bias in Alan Shearer article - please weigh in.

A user is certain that the GA-rated Alan Shearer article is seeping with bias. I'm both frustrated and a major contributor, so I'd appreciate the many experiences article writers of WP:FOOTY, taking a look at the arguments raised and see if the guy has a point. See Talk:Alan Shearer for the arguments either side. Cheers! – Toon^(talk) 01:47, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Template (Football in Romania)

Should ALL teams from Romania have in the bottom section of the page the template Template:Football_in_Romania ? I don't see its point as it only displays informations about Romanian competitions (not even the current season !), national team etc, and my guess is that that template should only be used on Liga I, Liga II, Cupa României and other pages linked from it. What do you think ? As I've removed that template from all Romanian football clubs and some other user started undoing my work.
As far as I saw, none of the teams from UK, Spain, Italy and other major leagues don't have their national football template. LaUr3nTiU (talk) 16:37, 10 March 2009 (UTC) Template:Fb start

Template:Fb end No reply... What do you guys think ? As far as I saw, most, if not all, teams from Europe don't show that Football in that_country on the teams article, but only on their premier division's article, for example. I need your sugesstion on this, as he says if I'll remove the template again from team articles he'll notice an admin to ban me.
Can we start a vote or something ? LaUr3nTiU (talk) 23:27, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

They should be removed, it is intended for articles such as leagues and football association, not for every club. There is also an issue with the Romanian football portal appearing on every player article no matter how teneous their link to Romanian football.

User:Bumvans

Just letting people be aware of a disruptive editor, User:Bumvans, who is consistently adding false information in footballer's articles. Cheers, Mattythewhite (talk) 17:28, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Blocked as a vandalism-only account. Looks like the same vandal that was blocked for edits made from an IP a couple of weeks ago - 91.109.104.199 (talk · contribs). Oldelpaso (talk) 18:27, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Merge?

Hi! I think Türk Telekomspor and Türk Telekom G.S.K. are one and the same team? Is there an expert who can merge the articles? Thanks and kind regards Doma-w (talk) 17:58, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

According to User talk:Prekazi81, Special:Contributions/Prekazi81 and Category:Turkish football clubs, the problem appears to be much bigger than that... — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:16, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Uff! But many thanks for the quick replay... Kind regards Doma-w (talk) 18:23, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

It looks like Prekazi81 created many of those on March 4, and is the lone editor. You can just turn them into redirects to the pre-existing articles without needing expert assistance, I would think. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:42, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

That would still leave some dubious moves, such as this one (which I have just moved back). The edit summary says: "The team board declared TFF that they want to use Antalya S.K: instead of Antalyaspor Kulübü. It's rumoured that they see that name more institutşonal but I don't have exact clues about that..." So we've got an intention to have the name changed, without any confirmation from reliable sources. Aecis·(away) ^talk 18:47, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, looking at Prekazi81's contributions, he seems to have finally discovered the "move" button, but I would still encourage a thorough review of all his actions by someone knowledgeable about these clubs. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 19:00, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I've re-directed the newly created Türk Telekom G.S.K. to the original. If the team name/article is to be changed, then the original page should be moved after a discussion, not a new page created. --Eastlygod (talk) 18:58, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Non-FIFA/Non-NF Board

• The teams that appear on the Non-FIFA template seem to have very little relation to each other. What is the point in grouping together regional teams (e.g. the Isle of Wight) with semi-autonomous regions (e.g. Extremadura) de facto states (e.g. Kosovo) sovereign states (e.g. Tuvalu, Marshall Islands) etc. etc.? There seems to be no criteria for inclusion or exclusion.

• The inclusion of this box seems to often be accompanied by the International football template, giving the ludicrous impression of, for example, the Isle of Wight being an international team.

• A number of the teams in the box appear to be created with the assumption that as there is a territory of that name, it will have a football team, e.g. Cabinda, Marshall Islands, without providing any evidence for the existence of a football team.

May I suggest that the teams listed on the template are verified as existing, and deleted if that can't be done? Also, there should be some sort of agreement on what constitutes a national team. I would say that it is clearly wrong to have a Prince Edward Island national team . PEI isn't a nation, it has no desire to be a separate nation, so why does it have a 'national soccer team'? Can I also suggest that teams that don't take part in international football are remoed from the template? Some of the teams are Indian states that only compete against each other; others are teams that compete in the Island Games, which has its own template.

Sorry if this is the wrong place to make these suggestions but I get the feeling I'm more likely to get a response here than on the talk page for the template- also I think there are more issues raised here than just that of the template. I would just mark things for deletion and edit the template but I'm new and I'd rather not annoy people by drastically altering their work without asking what other people think first Thanks Stu.W UK (talk) 06:50, 11 March 2009 (UTC)