Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football

Not to be confused with Wikipedia talk:WikiProject American football, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Australian rules football, or Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Canadian football.

Obtaining data from Wikidata? General opinions

Hi guys, I'm Yellowcard and mainly active in the German Wikipedia.

As you might have heard already, it is meanwhile possible to obtain data from Wikidata and, as Arbitrary Access was enabled, not only from the Wikidata item that is linked to the article but also from other articles. This means: It is possible to obtain data like the players' names in a club roster, or data of a player for the infobox (such as birthday, birthplace, teams and number of games played and goals scored). I tried this in the German Wikipedia: The squad template of Montreal Impact is triggered by the data from Wikidata (item: Q21011427), also the data in the infobox of Ambroise Oyongo (concretely: file name, birthday, number of games and goals for Impact and the date of the last update from Q2842397). It works properly and it would be possible to do even more.

In the German Wikipedia, we face the problem that we don't have enough active users to keep our articles up-to-date, escpecially for players in leagues outside of Europe. The MLS is a good example as we have maybe two or three active editors who update the players' articles which is not enough at all. Idea: If many Wikipedias would obtain some data from Wikidata and would maintain and update it there, all Wikipedia language versions would profit by that.

Of course, there would be some aspects to be talked about in advance, such as what kind of games is counted and what is not, but in the end it would be a fantastic improvement for all smaller language versions that could simply obtain up-to-date data without maintaining all the articles by themselves. So I'd like to ask you about your opinion: Would that be a general option for you to obtain some data from Wikidata and update the data in the Wikidata items directly? What problems do you excpect by doing so? And who would be open to take some steps towards this breaking change?

I'd appreciate if we could talk about the possibilities, potential problems and your willingness to maybe go this new way. I don't want to make changes at the current point of time, but rather have a general talk about this topic. Cheers from Germany, Yellowcard (talk) 20:04, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

What is the purpose of Wikidata ? I don't fully understand what its uses are. TheBigJagielka (talk) 15:35, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Basically, it is a huge database with free data. Besides other purposes, all Wikipedia langauge versions can obtain data from there. Example: birthday of Landon Donovan from Wikidata is 4 March 1982 (see wikitext). This is useful especially for data that changes from time to time. An author would update the data in the Wikidata item and the data would automatically be changed in all Wikipedia lanugage versions that obtain the data directly from Wikidata. Yellowcard (talk) 15:55, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

I would like to have this feature on our small-ish wiki (lvwiki), I was not aware that data about club roster there is so complete (is it?). Somebody has to start using it, otherwise there is not much motivation to keep it up to date in Wikidata. --Papuass (talk) 16:08, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Papuass - es zināju, ka pamanīsi :) other people - nevermind :) Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 17:09, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

@ Papuass: No, yet it is not that complete as it is for Montreal Impact. You name it, if the big Wikipedia versions start using Wikidata, there is a high motivation to keep the data up to date - and all the smaller Wikipedias would benefit (and more and more other projects as well). Yellowcard (talk) 17:47, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

There should be some capable bot operators for maintainin it. I see that you have added Surname for sorting (I would sort just by jersey number), this seems redundant, but could be maintained by bot. --Papuass (talk) 08:47, 6 October 2015 (UTC)

The surname was indeed redundant and I only added it for test purposes as the Lua module wasn't able to get the surname from the players' items. However, I added this function to the module yesterday and removed the surnames from the quad list. // What exactly to you want to maintain by bot? When there is data that is used widely on various Wikipedia projects, it has to be referenced very well and it has to be made sure that the sources are reliable for the league / player. I think that can be done by human beings much better that by bot. Otherwise we would end up in a huge amount of data without knowing how reliable the data is. Yellowcard (talk) 12:06, 8 October 2015 (UTC)

I thought bot could update these surnames fields. There could be some checks implemented either by bot or Wikidata constraints, for example: player should be only on one squad at a time. We would also need ot consider what to do with players without articles (in semi-professional leagues), but that could be sorted out later, after major leagues are covered.--Papuass (talk) 12:42, 8 October 2015 (UTC)

Edge cases: I thought a bit more, there are some edge cases to think about:

1. Small wikipedias do not have articles about lots of clubs. These wikipedias will need a label in Wikidata in their language.
2. Club has changed name, player history should show old club name. Can be handled as property constraint.
3. Loaned out players. Need a way to indicate that in player history.
4. Non-notable players. How to include them in clubs roster, if they are not allowed in Wikidata? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Papuass (talk • contribs) 15:00, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

--Papuass (talk) 09:12, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi Papuass, thanks for your thoughts! I want to answer them in the same order:

1. That is true. Those projects have two opportunities, in my opinion: Either they add the labels on Wikidata for these clubs – adding a label is not much work, escpecially not compared to writing an article – or they define a fallback language such as English or any other language that the specific language is related to. The items are displayed in that defined fallback language, as long as the label is not existent, then.
2. That can be handled by qualifiers, too. You could add multiple names and add specific qualifiers (start time, end time) that specify when the name was valid.
3. There is already a way by using acquisition transaction (P1642) (example: Romario Williams (Q19693221)). I wrote a lua script for the infoboxes in de.wp that handles the loans properly, see the infobox in de:Romario Williams ("loan" means "Leihe"). This is convertible to the English Wikipedia without too much effort.
4. Players should always be notable in Wikidata when they belong or belonged to a notable club. See d:Wikidata:Notability, criteria 2 and 3 should always be met. Cheers, Yellowcard (talk) 19:04, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

While the players in squad navbox of Montreal Impact are ordered according to their family name, ordering by shirt number is also possible: de:Vorlage:Navigationsleiste Kader des FC Lausanne-Sport (d:Q20870955, {{FC Lausanne-Sport squad}}). The latter possibility seems to be preferred here. --Leyo 21:17, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Team positions in team tables

Hi again, I have two questions regarding tables.

1. When teams have played matches and have the exact same tiebreakers should we just display them alphabetically with positions as 1, 2, 3 and so on or should we put position as 1 (pos = 1) on all the tied teams? Should the same be done for teams that have not played? I am currently mainly thinking about Template:2018 FIFA World Cup qualification – CONMEBOL table, where both Colombia and Uruguay has one 2-0 win.
2. Folloing the first question, should we diplay pos = 1 for all teams when no matches has been played?

The risk of leaving it would be editors moving teams with same position around, to have "their team" on top.

Any answers would be appreciated. Qed237 (talk) 22:56, 8 October 2015 (UTC)

if the templates support alphanumeric instead of strict numeric, I'd say a tie indicator would be appropriate, i.e. T1 like golf uses. For a tournament that hasn't started yet perhaps the positions should be left blank?--John, AF4JM (talk) 00:40, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

Agree with John that that's the most satisfactory outcome if possible. That probably requires going to Module:Sports table and seeing if it is possilbe and/or if it can be added in. In absence of the technical capacity to do that, I'd suggest sticking with Alphabetical order but not particularly worrying if editors do want to move their teams around --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 13:34, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

The manual way of changing positions is already implemented and can be seen at tested at User:Qed237/sandbox5 (first example is the current table). What does John, AF4JM, Super Nintendo Chalmers and everyone else think of those examples? It would need some more editing in the template to update positions but it is definately possible. Qed237 (talk) 14:01, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

perhaps some coding can be made so that no positions is shown when |update=future. Or maybe everyone should be in position 1? Qed237 (talk) 14:03, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

I am not averse to either of the options presented (alphabetic by nation/club name, same position number, or alphanumeric "T" positions). As far as a specific order, if the teams are presented in a specific order by FIFA or CONMEBOL, then that should be the displayed order. After one matchday, I am not surprised that four teams are tied for first. — Jkudlick ^tc_s 14:30, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

The official source from FIFA lists them alphabetic by nation/club name but they dont have the "pos"-row that we have, and the question is what we should have there. Qed237 (talk) 14:41, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

Best would be equal numbers i guess, or no number for any but the first of the tied teams. But for simplicity of the template I'd just go 1,2,3... and not care about tie-breaks. -Koppapa (talk) 14:45, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

<reduce indent> Equal numbers or no numbers after the first tied team gets my vote too. I slightly prefer the 'T1' option over '1', which is probably just an aesthetic thing. Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 14:55, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

I think any of the options at User:Qed237/sandbox5 would adequately convey the tie. Inclusion of the T makes it jump out a bit more visually so the eye isn't tricked into thinking it's 1, 2, 3, etc. Ideally they'd go to a multi-row box like the "Qualified to..." does, but I don't think it's worth making that major modification to a template that's used all over Wikipedia when that change really only affects competitions that are still in progress.

One of these days I need to take the time to convert the league table at Primera División de Fútbol Profesional – Apertura 2015 to use this template because it should make it much easier to edit than the Template:Fb cl header and related team templates that it's using now (which seem more appropriate for short-term stuff like tournament group play).  Done --John, AF4JM (talk) 18:09, 9 October 2015 (UTC) edited 20:58, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

Basically, I am in favour of the status quo, but if any changes are made, I would prefer the same numbered positions. Otherwise, I will not oppose, as long as those eventual changes don't disrupt league table templates. The Replicator (talk) 18:51, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

I would not say I prefer the status quo, but I would be fine with it staying the same. This is a very rare occurrence outside of the first couple of matches, and quickly resolves itself. If there is to be a change, I don't like the look of the "T" even though I know that it's used with other sports. Equineducklings (talk) 20:17, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

In the linked example the top position should be 1 and the next four should be replaced by an =. The same procedure should then repeated for places 6-10. Ties are only broken once a completion has completely finished. Tvx1 20:53, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

If I make a summary of this, and please correct me if I am wrong, it feels like many want to display that teams have same position in someway, although tables change quickly and it might not always be needed. The T (for example T1) was suggested, but it is not commonly used in football, and some editors did not like it and those that did like it did not care that much. For that reason I would like to say that current consensus here is to use regular numbers to show team positions like the example below.

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Chile	1	1	0	0	2	0	+2	3	Qualification to 2018 FIFA World Cup
1	Colombia	1	1	0	0	2	0	+2	3
1	Ecuador	1	1	0	0	2	0	+2	3
1	Uruguay	1	1	0	0	2	0	+2	3
5	Paraguay	1	1	0	0	1	0	+1	3	Advance to Inter-confederation play-offs
6	Venezuela	1	0	0	1	0	1	−1	0
7	Argentina	1	0	0	1	0	2	−2	0
7	Bolivia	1	0	0	1	0	2	−2	0
7	Brazil	1	0	0	1	0	2	−2	0
7	Peru	1	0	0	1	0	2	−2	0

Updated to match(es) played on 8 October 2015. Source: FIFA
Rules for classification: Qualification tiebreakers

Have I got this right or wrong? If no editor opposes I will make these changes to the world cup qualification tables shortly. Qed237 (talk) 12:29, 10 October 2015 (UTC)

I believe your summary is correct. As Equineducklings pointed out, this will likely not be required after three or four matchdays, but I think it will help quell any possible arguments of "Why is this country ranked above that country when they are completely equal?" — Jkudlick ^tc_s 12:48, 10 October 2015 (UTC)

First of all, thanks to Qed237 that noticed me this discussion (sorry for delay). Well, basically I could agree with the status quo (1, 2, 3, 4, 5 etc...), because it seems to be the most used form, but I've not a defined idea. Btw, seeing Qed's sandbox, and the CONMEBOL table improved by him, it's ok for me. Well done. Regards :-) --Dэя-Бøяg 01:53, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with maintaining the status quo and having the teams numbered individually, rather than giving a bunch a mass number, personally. Let's face facts, it will be rare for a situation to occur past a point of say three league games wherein teams will be on an exact number of points, goals, goal difference, yellow cards and red cards. By showing tied teams, aren't we indirectly conflicting with FIFA Articles 20.6-9, wherein teams must be tie-broken?

I think that these changes are only being brought up to counter a potential issue of someone asking "why is X before Y". If we are bringing up this hypothetical person having that issue, then others could argue that any team positioned in equal first shouldn't be in a position in any table where they are in an elimination position.

There is no issue with including a small footnote as to why X is before Y. Also QED, I think you should probably undo the changes you've put into the tables until it has been voted upon and passed. Thanks - J man708 (talk) 15:36, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

Again Qed237, do you mind not making changes until they've been voted on? Please wait longer than 1 day to assume that there is no opposition. - J man708 (talk) 19:56, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@J man708: Several users has participated and no editor has really opposed except you and there seems to be a consesus. Also consenusus is not done by voting. Qed237 (talk) 20:02, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@Qed237:, no editor has overly seemed to support it in favour of the status quo, either? There's no consensus for it to change, over retaining the status quo. Perhaps if it were more definitive and had a lot of pro responses, sure. But it doesn't, it has a few week supports, mainly in favour of a T1 set up, if anything. Please refrain from being so jumpy to change things if there is no immediate objection in the future. 24 hours generally isn't sufficient. - J man708 (talk) 20:40, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

WP:DEADHORSE — Jkudlick ^tc_s 21:11, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

It has now been 11 days, and I made a summary which was agreed on. The consensus could still change but no one else has wanted to weigh in. Also it was a current issue for a few days. As Jkudlick points out, WP:DROPTHESTICK Qed237 (talk) 21:19, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@Qed237: "If no editor opposes I will make these changes to the world cup qualification tables shortly." - 12:29, 10 October 2015. Edits to the OFC 2018 page made - 12:56, 11 October 2015‎. I'm asking you in the future to show a little more courtesy to those who aren't on this page often and to please refrain from assuming that no objections exist after 24 hours. This isn't the first time I've seen you jump the gun on something and then subsequently argue the point.

@Jkudlick:, it's hardly flogging a dead horse if one responded four days after a message and then waited five for a response. It's still a live issue, hence why it's still active on the discussion page. - J man708 (talk) 21:42, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I am still monitoring the discussion, in case consensus changes, so I see no reason why I could not go on and make the changes during the current consensus. Qed237 (talk) 21:45, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Well then, how about you monitor it and address the issues which I brought up on my October 14 post, rather than picking holes in the timeliness of it all? Also again, you have failed to acknowledge the request I've made of you to in the future allowing for more time, rather than making changes and immediately shut up shop when it comes to discussion for the latecomers? - J man708 (talk) 21:53, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I wanted to give other editors a chance to respond, and then I simply forgot. If this thread would be about only me answering questions that is not a good discussion, I was looking to see if others would comment. About your FIFA rule commment, I dont know exactly what rule you are talking about, but for FIFA World Cup (the templates being changed) all of the official tournament has been followed and when teams are still tied they have same position. If this would happen at end of group stage, there will be extra play-off matches. And about the notes I dont think it would be good to add more notes, it would mean notes for almost everything and I dont think that is the way to go. Qed237 (talk) 22:55, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

What I was getting at is that with the current set up, showing every team as #1, we've got teams sitting in position #1 failing to advance to the next stage, wherein say three teams are meant to advance. A team in position #1 (shown in the fifth slot) should never be in a position of elimination (moreso failure to advance), which is what the current proposal shows. Subsequently, we're now left in a position wherein FIFA qualifiers are all positioned in place #1, and yet domestic league competitions show teams ranked #1-#20. Why is it okay for international teams to be #1, but domestic clubs are ranked normally? Where do we stand on friendly international tournaments involving 4 national teams? Or international club tournaments like the Club World Cup? I feel that this proposal just adds more confusion and of the technical side of it all, rather than keeping it simple and having a rule to cover most tournaments. - J man708 (talk) 23:24, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm with Qed237 on this one, as I've indicated above. I've been doing a lot of work at this season's El Salvador league page, partially because it needed help and I needed practice, and part because my wife is Salvadoran, anyway, I added a table with positions by matchday, and put = after ties there, because it's less obvious than in the first column of a table Primera División de Fútbol Profesional – Apertura_2015#Positions_by_round.

In clicking around before replying here, I noticed 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification – OFC Third Round self-redirects to 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification (OFC)#Third_round. Seems like the kind of thing that should be corrected on site, feel free to visit my talk page if you disagree. Similarly, if anyone knows how to make the Salvadoran table I linked to have a 2 line header like the same table in the La Liga page, which I copied as a template for this one, please let me know because the code looked identical to me (until I commented out the row rendering blank) but the results were quite different.--John, AF4JM (talk) 02:07, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

The issue I see is that we have domestic club leagues showing unique numbers for all teams that are drawn and then international qualifiers showing multiple teams tied on the same number.... Consistency?

Also, where do we stand when we have two or more teams tied on the same points, but only one of them is in a qualifier spot? Why is Team A1 shown as sitting in the qualifier's spot, but A4 is not? If we're showing that they're tied by means of all teams having the #1 next to their name, then we show that a team in position #1 (in this case all teams shown) is sitting in a position to qualify for the next stage. Who are we to decide that team A1 is more deserving to be positioned in the qualifier's spot than team A4, if they're all shown as being tied? - J man708 (talk) 02:37, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

I am no stranger to implement this whenever I see two tied teams. I already follow all top division tables in Europe as well as many other tables (they are in my sandbox for monitoring) and it is very easy to do. The "qualification-column" shows what happens on those positions, but the rest of the table is always "current table" with the current stats and positions and if teams are tied, they are tied, and then we should somehow display it. Qed237 (talk) 11:31, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Match of the Century (1953 England v Hungary football match)

I stumbled across this snappily titled article. I wonder if we can come up with a better title? Comments please here --Dweller (talk) 12:15, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

Please? --Dweller (talk) 08:31, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

@Dweller: - England v Hungary (1953)? GiantSnowman 11:23, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

What is a club's "full name"?

As you are probably aware, the infobox for football clubs includes a parameter called "full name". What exactly is meant by this? At 1. FC Magdeburg there is a disagreement between myself and 37 about the exact meaning. Per the club's statute, its full name is "1. FC Magdeburg e. V.", and I hold that this should be entered in the full name parameter. However, 37 argues that FC itself is an abbreviation and should therefore be spelled out. I argued that other football clubs, such as FC Schalke 04 define their name to be "Fußballclub Gelsenkirchen-Schalke 04 e.V., abgekürzt „FC Schalke 04 e.V.“" and so we should use the legal moniker of the club. As we have not been able to reach a conclusion to the discussion, I'd ask for you guys to comment. I have linked to this discussion on the talk page. Madcynic (talk) 12:33, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

As I've noted on the talk page there, its full name is its full name. For most clubs, this will be 'Fußballclub', 'Football Club' etc. However if it is only registered as 1.FC Magdeburg then it should be '1.FC Magdeburg'. For an English example, AFC Wimbledon are quite clear that 'AFC' is just initials - it does not stand for 'Association Football Club'. Most cases will required Fußballclub but there are exceptions; Magdeburg may be one. The best way of settling it would be to find out the name under which it has its license with the German FA --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 10:24, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

The German examples are showing the full name of the legal entity. By that measure we would be using "AFC Wimbledon Limited" or "The Arsenal Football Club Plc". Hack (talk) 02:38, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

+/- 3000 more stubs?

With Excel and notepad (only) I'm able to create in a fast way many articles. For creating an article, get it linked to foreign wiki's and creating redirects, cost me about 1 minutes per page. I created this month already >700 Volleyball stubs (see here), like Manuela Secolo, Patricia Soto, Yulissa Zamudio and will create even more in the next weeks. If people are willing to do the same for football, I can help :). I can create excel templates for the FIFA Women's World Cup players and Summer Olympics footballers. We are talking about +/- 3000 pages (raw guess), but I don't have time to do it. I can give the Excel file or upload it somewhere so all the missing players can be created, or missing infoboxes can be added to articles! Let me know if people are enthousiastic :). Cheers, Sander.v.Ginkel ^(Talk) 22:18, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

I did it a few years ago for obscure World Cup players, for example Gerrit Faulhaber. It is worth doing for these types of players.--EchetusXe 22:56, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Do it. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 07:13, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

I'd be interested in helping out with this... GiantSnowman 10:58, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

I'd also be interested in helping. — Jkudlick ^tc_s 11:13, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@Sander.v.Ginkel: any news on this please? GiantSnowman 08:28, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi Giant, sorry for my late reply. Great that you are willing to create these players. Yes I will make some excell file to create the football players. Where is the best place to upload these files? Sander.v.Ginkel ^(Talk) 08:37, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Feel free to e-mail it to me. GiantSnowman 09:54, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Me too if more than one person can be involved. Fenix down (talk) 10:12, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Does FIFA have final authority on statistics?

Allow me to dive in with an example: Jan Vertonghen from Belgium has 74 caps according to Belgium's Football Association, but 72 according to FIFA because two of those matches were not officially recognized (due to too many subs). So all Belgian Wikipedia pages list him as having 72 caps, not 74. Same goes for 'the amount of matches' the whole team has played, etcetera. In the meanwhile, many other websites will list him as having 74 caps, since that's what is displayed on the team's official website.

Now I'm wondering whether Wikipedia 'must' actually follow FIFA. It is a huge authority, of course, but should every statistic be in relation to FIFA? If an article is about Belgium, should it instead follow its own football association or perhaps UEFA instead? UEFA also still lists that match, for example. –Sygmoral (talk) 03:38, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

This is an excellent question. I don't have an answer to it, but I do have a proposed solution: have a footnote that briefly explains the cap difference. I think consensus should determine which number gets to stay in the chart (or maybe no number at all could also work).--MarshalN20 ^Talk 03:50, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

FIFA awards the caps insofar as they determine whether games are official or not. So I always go with FIFA over national FAs, especially as their standards are sometimes lax. GiantSnowman 10:59, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

I would go with FIFA here and only count official matches ad then also add a note as suggested by MarshalN20 saying he has also played two unofficial matches. Qed237 (talk) 13:58, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

This was also discussed in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Archive 92#Unofficial matches. Smartskaft (talk) 14:45, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

Where this no clear position on match status from FIFA, you'd have to go with the player's football association and add a note explaining the situation. Hack (talk) 06:59, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I'd go with FIFA here, but a footnote mentioning the unofficial matches is also just as necessary in my mind. - J man708 (talk) 22:08, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Division in introduction for players

Sorry to raise this old chestnut again (personally I don't really have an opinion on it), but from what I understood is that the main problem is the automatic updating required to ensure all player articles are accurate. I think I may have found a way around this. We need to create a single template (say {{English club divisions}}) in which the current league of all the clubs is stored. In player articles, this can then be used in the text to list the division (so for example, the code would look like "Player X currently plays in {{English club divisions|Footown United}} for Footown United). Whatever division was in the template (links also work) would then be displayed. This would allow us to update thousands of articles by updating a single template.

I spotted this in use for Scottish football ground capacities, and have recently started using it for populations of places in Israel (see {{Israel populations}} and use at Sde Boker. I'm sure this has plenty of other applications – for example club infoboxes where current division and previous seasons are stated. I recall another discussion we had about automatic updates, but I can't remember what it was regarding. Number 57 16:34, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

I don'T think that's a good idea. That will create 100s of templates, which userers will use wrong and they will be as wrong, if they don't get updated in time, or updated but the inclusion is not. -Koppapa (talk) 07:21, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@Koppapa: I think you've misunderstood – only one template is needed, as it contains all the information. Have a look again at the Sde Boker example. Only this one template needs to be updated to update all the articles (the Israel populations one will eventually be used on 1,200+ articles) and save a hell of a lot of work. Number 57 09:46, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

This looks like a good solution to me if you have the tech skills to create it and one or two examples? Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 11:33, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@Super Nintendo Chalmers and Koppapa: I have created a template at {{EFCDP}}, and have done a couple of examples of its use – Dean Gerken and Jonny Howson. Hope that makes it clear how it works? Number 57 21:57, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@Number 57: would that template be negatively affected in anyway should a club be relegated? - J man708 (talk) 22:04, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@J man708: The whole idea of the template is that it is the only thing we need to update at the end of a season, and all the articles will change automatically. Open the template using the edit button, and you'll see what appears when the "switch" (the club name) is used on an article. This is all we'll need to edit. Number 57 22:11, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Cool, cool. Seems easy enough. I'd like to see it used. - J man708 (talk) 22:14, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

This could be a good idea, if it is at least semi-protected or template-protected (as it would be used on many places and vandalism would affect many articles). I am more concerned over how to use it in the articles so we dont implicate teams play only in PL or Championship, but thy can also play Champions League and Europa League. Then we also have the issue with lower level leagues, where some players are not updated when they change club, then both club and league will be wrong, instead of just outdated (for example player A did play in Watford last season but sold without article updated so now it say "Watford in the Premier League" which is incorrect and has never happened, while "Watford in the Championship" would be outdated). Qed237 (talk) 23:05, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Yes, that's the point i was making, Qed. Also an if switch with like 500 clubs (only england) wouldn't that be kind of slow. Also how does it work technically, is the whole template loaded when you visit an article? Just that might be 10x times larger than the whole article :D. -Koppapa (talk) 06:49, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

No, I've been using the Israel populations template (which has over 1,200 entries) on the Israel place articles for a few days and there are no issues with speed.

With regards to the Champions League issue, this sounds more like an objection to including the division in the introduction in general, which is another discussion entirely. This is simply about solving a problem with articles that currently use the division. Number 57 07:45, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Koppapa - of course, 500 clubs won't need changing as most don't get promoted or relegated in a season. If we presume that the template operates as low as the National League, then 30 updates a season would cover England, which is the country with the largest professional league structure! With regards to Qed's concern - that's a broader issue about the club not being updated rather than league not being updated, as the underlying problem is that the article would still say 'is a Watford player'! Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 08:32, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

This looks good to me, the template editing should definitely be restricted to template editors/admins as it will be used in hundreds of articles. Certainly helps get rid of my previous concerns about divisions in intros not being updated. GiantSnowman 08:30, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

I don't edit football articles that often so my opinion shouldn't count for much here, but I just wanted to say this is a very elegant solution. Jenks24 (talk) 08:36, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

I've upped the protection level to template editors & admins only. Does anyone want to take this on? I'm rather busy at the moment, but it was just a suggestion for others to take forward. Cheers, Number 57 09:05, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

I just have two more questions. Why "EFCDP" as the template name, what does it stand for? In my mind things should always has a name so you understand what it is. Secondly, what happens with teams that are no longer on the list? For example, say we add top four English tiers and then when season is over some teams will be relegated to fifth tier and what will then happen to those player articles? We can not just remove them from the template, yet we can not keep updating those teams forever. The team list will just grow. Qed237 (talk) 11:04, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

(1) It stands for English Football Club Divisions in Prose – I thought best to keep the template title as short as possible. The reason I added the "in Prose" at the end is in case we do a similar one for infoboxes – again, to save the annual updating of hundreds of articles. (2) The template doesn't have to be limited to the top four divisions, and I see no reason why all the other teams cannot be updated annually too. Number 57 11:41, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

I'd suggest a rename of the template, to make it easier to find for people. {{English football club divisions}}? GiantSnowman 11:24, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I'll second the suggestion for less cryptic template names. Also, looking at the template, I have to ask why it would add "the" before each league name? Doing so would mean it could only be used in prose and not in the header box. I think that if prose needs "the" in front of the league name it should be in the prose not in the template.--John, AF4JM (talk) 18:50, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

When you refer to "the header box", what do you mean? A player's infobox doesn't mention the division his club plays in anywhere.... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 18:57, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

And some leagues have "the" and some dont. If we leave that to the article, then we are back to the same issue having to update all of the articles again. Qed237 (talk) 19:50, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Good points. I was thinking about the boxes at the top of the team pages, but combined with Qed237's point about "the" or not "the", it's probably better the way it is, because at least 95% of the edits needed when a team changes leagues would be covered by the template in prose-only format, picking up those extra few manually isn't that big of a deal. I had forgotten about it, but just noticed Number 57's comment above about possibly having a separate template for that as well.--John, AF4JM (talk) 20:05, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I thought I recommended something alike this a while ago - but my thought was via improving the Footballer infobox, or adding a "club" infobox. Either way, if it's supportable then go for it - although I think including the division in the lede is really unnecessary. Koncorde (talk) 20:58, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I don't think this is a good idea tbh. It solves a problem, sure, but the problem itself is very minor and the solution seems way too convoluted. The simplest solution, if we must include a club's division in the lead section of a player biography, would be to simply update the article manually. – PeeJay 16:30, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

I disagree completely, PeeJay. The problem is that when a team gets promoted or relegated, then 20-some player articles become wrong. Within any one league, it's typically 2-4 teams meaning possibly as many as 100 player articles that would need to be updated. This idea is to have that information in 1 template. I can't speak for everyone, but I'd rather update 1 template than 100 articles.--John, AF4JM (talk) 16:50, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Creating international events statistic section

Hereunder is the topic moved from the subsection Players. Please share your opinion:

While in most of articles about football players performing at international level, we can find "international statistics" section with apps and goals scored in particular years, I've been always missing a section where I could read how a player performed during international events. For that purpose I put some work to edit some articles I follow and created extra sections called "international events". It's based on a template used by NHL ice hockey players. I made that edit for 6 articles, here is the example of such a list for created for Neymar:

International events

Only major international events including the Olympic Games with U23 team

Year	Event	Place	Apps	Goals	Result	Individual
2011	Copa América	Argentina	4	2	QF
2012	Summer Olympics	London, England	6	3
2013	Confederations Cup	Brazil	5	4		Golden Ball, Dream Team, Bronze Shoe
2014	World Cup	Brazil	5	4	4th	Bronze Boot, Dream Team
2015	Copa América	Chile	2	1	QF

All the edits has been however reverted by Qed237 who believes that there is no need for such lists and that it's a POV in a way of describing "major" competitions. My idea is that the list gives a reader nice overview of how a player performed at international events, and that describing "major" events is quite easy in football. At international level we have youth, friendly, qualifying and "major" competitions where we have got FIFA World Cup, continental championships, FIFA Confederations Cup plus the Summer Olympic Games tournament being all official events under FIFA or respective confederations.

Please give me idea if a layout of such lists could exist for football players. Ksihoo 21:54 (CET), 14 October 2015

@Ksihoo: not many editors follow this subsection, I would recommend WT:FOOTY. Qed237 (talk) 15:03, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

FWIW I don't think these kind of stats tables should be added, per NOTSTATS. GiantSnowman 17:11, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

I don't think it's POV to determine what are "major" comps at all - there is a pretty clear hierarchy involving the World Cup, Confederations Cup, Olympics and the 6 Continental titles. Certainly such sections would be informative and easy to source. WP:NOTSTATS could be relevant, the question being would this lead to "excessive" listing of statistics? For mine, it's alright - very few of these tables would be beyond 10 lines, and few beyond 5. That said, I'm sure people will have differing opinions on what is "excessive" (e.g. GiantSnowman above) but that's my take. Macosal (talk) 04:58, 17 October 2015 (UTC)

Youssouf Ahamadi / Hamadi Combo

Hello to you all. I was working on Comoros national team page and came accross this probleme, so here I am to gather opinions on this subject. I think that the two pages Youssouf Ahamadi and Hamadi Combo actually are about the same player.

Combo is actually the nickname of Ahamadi (as can be seen on this official Comoros FA Article : "De même, Hamadi Youssouf, dit Combo, qui évolue cette année en national avec Belfort, actuellement en pleine forme, retrouve la sélection après un an et demi-d'absence.", which can be roughly translated as "H. Youssouf, nicknamed Combo, who plays in National with Belfort this year, is back with the national team after an 18-months absence"). Plus, the national-football-teams.com profile for Combo is completely empty of information except for one single international game. And there is no trace of Combo on football databases nor Belfort official website.

Does anyone agree with me that the two pages should be merged, or a redirect applyied to Combo's article to Ahamadi, as it's seems to be the player's common name ? Thanks for your opinion, Tuttiseme (talk) 14:58, 18 October 2015 (UTC)

They should be the one article. I've redirected Hamadi Combo to Youssouf Ahamadi. TheBigJagielka (talk) 15:35, 18 October 2015 (UTC)

I've merged the histories. GiantSnowman 15:50, 18 October 2015 (UTC)

Good spot guys. I've readded some of the stuff removed by the history merge. BigDom (talk) 18:20, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Help with Omani First and Second Division tables

One of my friends, User talk:Alhosniomani20, has been trying to get a table of the 2015–16 Oman First Division League and 2015–16 Oman Second Division League fixed and I tried to help but I couldn't even find a solution. He is referencing this. He only wants 6 rounds but for some reason the table won't go below 16. Cheers. --ArsenalFan700 (talk) 07:43, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I have reduced the minimum necessary number of matches to be displayed in the template from 16 to 4. Hope that helps. – Soccer-holic^{I hear voices in my head...} 08:32, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

The group templates being used in these articles and in 2015–16 Oman Professional League are actually deprecated, and using Module:Sports table is preferred. I'll see what I can do to help with that conversion. — Jkudlick ^tc_s 11:49, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

On unrelated note, I wonder why does this relatively simple page need 107 references? -BlameRuiner (talk) 06:09, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Agreed, several of the managers have multiple references, in some cases as many as 4. Of course, to clean it up without guessing requires being able to read the language. On a related note, is it correct for the references to show up that way? I would have expected them to be in English with a note in parens indicating the original language, or am I confused on that one?--John, AF4JM (talk) 13:22, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Requested merge

Could someone please merge John McMillan (footballer, born 1865) and William McMillan (footballer) as they have now been identified as the same person. Thanks. 78.147.107.176 (talk) 19:20, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Done, page now at William McMillan (footballer, born 1872). Jmorrison230582 (talk) 19:44, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Squad articles

Curiosity question: why are we having a complete squad pages for UEFA Youth League seasons, but not, for example, Champions League seasons? -BlameRuiner (talk) 22:43, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

One could easily ask the same question in reverse. Why do we have a page for UEFA Youth League squads when we don't have them for the Champions League? Personally I don't think we should have either. – PeeJay 23:45, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm with PeeJay. Squad articles are typically for national team tournaments, not cups or leagues. Number 57 09:59, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

{{F.C. Internazionale Milano}} is unreadable

I raised this a last month but with out much input Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Football/Archive_98#Colourful_Navboxes . Rather than remove the colours , can someone who knows about this club make this template readable? Gnevin (talk) 09:06, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

The colours on this version from Jan 2015 are slightly better than the current version; I have restored these. There's no way of making light blue on navy blue easily readable. The alternative would be to change the text on the navy backgrounds to white - there is prominent white on the Inter badge. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:53, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

This would be with white text on the dark backgrounds. --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 09:59, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

I've changed it to use white text, but who knows how long that will last before some Inter fanboy changes it back. – PeeJay 11:41, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks . It's a pity we can't just fix all these by removing the colours. There are so many unreadable templates Gnevin (talk) 11:55, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

I completely disagree with that idea. Colours are quite informative and can help you pick out the navbox you want among a list of them. It's just a matter of finding combinations of colours for each team that are accessible to the reader. – PeeJay 14:59, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

WP:Football Stub Contest

With this project being one the largest in WP, is there any interest in setting up a Wikipedia:Stub Contest, specific for football-related subjects? Over 100,000 articles are assessed as stub in the article statistics, so there's a lot to go through. We could use most of the rules already defined, or modified them according to consensus. Is it feasible?--Threeohsix (talk) 12:18, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

I'd certainly be willing to give it a go, time permitting. GiantSnowman 21:24, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

And some sections above users semi-auto create thousands of stubs and everyone is fine with that? -Koppapa (talk) 13:43, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

I agree with you Koppapa. Actually it's a pretty pointless enterprise. Yet alone when I think of the quality of most football related articles...mostly just an incoherent collection of trivia. DrunkenGerman (talk) 14:08, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Football club sorting

Hi, started adding DEFAULTSORT to members of Category:Football clubs in Algeria eg "Belouizdad, CR" to CR Belouizdad, is this OK ? I thought this was the standard but thought I'd better check here first, I got as far as J - am I OK to continue or should I undo the changes I have made thus far (A to I) Thanks GrahamHardy (talk) 16:27, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

No, that looks fine to me. GiantSnowman 21:22, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Gareth Bale

Over the last few days, a series of edits have been made to the section titles so that we now have, for example "2011–12: Consistent performer" and "2013–14: Cup finals match winner". To me, these don't seem very encyclopaedic and are probably in breach of the "no PoV" rule. Does anyone else agree? 2.96.234.223 (talk) 19:53, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Agreed; removed. GiantSnowman 21:24, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

!

Hello to all, can you help me to delete this page ([[Category:Albanian expatriates in the Bulgaria]]) because i created it accidentaly while editing Klodian Semina. There is already a page named [[Category:Albanian expatriates in Bulgaria]]. I Cannot delete it bcz im not an adm. Thank you. -- Sadsadas, talk, 00:41 (CET).

I have listed this for Speedy Deletion --Super Nintendo Chalmers (talk) 08:16, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Liga II

Liga II - there are a lot of seasons missing, if everyone will choose one, all the seasons will be done by the end of the year, so please start with the second edition, the first one is already done summarily.

I have also references : [1] and [2], for each season.

Just add the information in Wikipedia tables, I will correct if you do not tag correct the teams. Thank you !--Alexiulian25 (talk) 15:33, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure this WikiProject has more important things to worry about than a few missing seasons in the history of the Romanian second division... – PeeJay 16:19, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

I see a day in the future when Wikipedia will be the bigger football database ! The format is very good, easy to find what you need, you can go on other page just with a click, and read about teams, players, anything.

Just edit one season, everyone will edit one and will be done in one week ! And after we will start with another country ! Thanks !--Alexiulian25 (talk) 17:16, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia for notable content, and not a football database. I have to agree with PeeJay here, there are more important things to work with. Qed237 (talk) 17:43, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Now is an encyclopedia for notable content, but in the far future when we will add more and more information, the Football part can split and become a database. The format allow to access fast any information, no other football website is so easy and practically in finding various information, all together, by a click or 2 apart. Is still many things missing, and the edits take time, is not just Copy - Paste unfortunately.--Alexiulian25 (talk) 18:50, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

One day I hope we can add also all time top scorers (top 100-200), like we also have all time tables for important leagues, actually some Wikipedia already have, like Italian and Spanish, and why not a program to calculate for us the points, goals and anything, we just to add the results ! That is the future which Wikipedia Football should have !--Alexiulian25 (talk) 18:53, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Thierry Henry

If someone would want to take a look at Thierry Henry that would be appreciated. This article is a featured article, but at the latest" Featured article review" in 5 December 2009 the lead was 4 paragraphs and 367 words (see this diff), and WP:LEADLENGTH says three or four paragraphs. However the lead has grown and editors have added to much info not belonging there and now it is 5 paragraphs and 582 words and it looks way to big.

Can someone help with cleanup? I dont have the time now myself, otherwise I could do it myself. Qed237 (talk) 16:43, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Dave Mitchell (footballer)

Can someone look at this article about an Australian footballer. His "International goals" sections includes goals against Rangers, Red Star Belgrade, Caroline Hill (Hong Kong) and "Dez Marton Squad". As none of these are full international matches, they should be removed. This brings his goal tally down to 11 whereas the infobox credits him with 13 goals for Australia in 44 matches.

The Soccerway reference cited relates to a totally different player (K. Amri from Singapore). The National Football Teams site credits him with 11 goals in 27 matches, whereas the Australian Player Database at Ozfootball credits him with 13 goals in 44 appearances for the "Socceroos" (the same as the infobox), but this includes a whole host of matches against European club sides - as well as those mentioned, there are matches against Nottingham Forest, Juventus, FC Twente, and several others. If I've spotted them all, the club matches total 15. If these are excluded, this brings the total full internationals down to 29.

Are there any reliable sources which show which Australian matches are deemed to be "full" internationals? Before changing the article, the final result should be properly sourced and referenced. 78.147.149.132 (talk) 09:30, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

p.s. On looking again at the article, there is so much that is wrong with it, I wouldn't know where to start trying to fix it. The whole article is virtually unreferenced and is so full of opinions and "cruft". Help'!!!!! 78.147.149.132 (talk) 09:37, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

RSSSF credits him with 11 goals, but he is not shown in their list of players with 30 or more appearances. 92.24.170.160 (talk) 10:00, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Ossett Town Ladies FC

Does Ossett Town Ladies FC pass WP:NFOOTBALL... ? JMHamo (talk) 09:42, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

I can not see any claims in the article supporting notability. I doubt wp:GNG is met. Some "saved" clubs I've nominated for deletion, are saved because it was added information about participation in a national cup, like the FA-cup or Svenska Cupen (Swedish national cup). Grrahnbahr (talk) 10:05, 24 October 2015 (UTC)