Jump to content

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Somerset County Cricket Club in 2009/archive1

Add links
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by SandyGeorgia 21:29, 26 November 2010 [1].

Somerset County Cricket Club in 2009

[edit]

Somerset County Cricket Club in 2009 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Toolbox
Nominator(s): Harrias talk 14:59, 30 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this for featured article because I feel it comprehensively covers the topic, and provides a neutral and well-written analysis. This is the first article I have nominated for FA, so it is likely there will be short-comings in the article, but I'm happy to work with reviewers to overcome any of these problems. It has undergone a peer review (here) and is currently a Good Article (review). Harrias talk 14:59, 30 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sources comments: The sources and citations all look OK. Brianboulton (talk) 21:21, 1 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A few general nitpicks:-

  • Unnecessary linking: "Australian" in lead
  • Unlinked.
  • Unlinked on most occasions.
  • Daily Telegraph in Background needs italics
  • Done.
  • Same section, The Guardian needs italics and link
  • Was already linked, italicised though.
  • List A should be linked at first mention (it is subsequently linked)
  • Done, also linked first-class and Twenty20 at first mention. Left subsequent link for List A as it isn't a commonly used term.
  • Long reference strings within the text should be avoided. The way to do this is to create a single footnote which contains all the references.
  • Not quite sure how I would do this, could you provide an example from another article that I can copy learn from?
  • Inconsistency, with "twenty wickets" and "20 wickets" in the article.
  • Changed to "20 wickets" throughout.

Brianboulton (talk) 21:21, 1 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your comments. Harrias talk 09:43, 2 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments – Just a few quick nit-picks from me:

  • Background: No need for two County Championship links here.
  • Unlinked on second use.
  • Same goes for Ian Blackwell. It might be worth scanning for this elsewhere.
  • Unlinked on second use. Will check for more.
  • County Championship: Prose redundancy in "The helpful batting conditions did help...".
  • Done, changed to "These batting conditions did help...".
  • Changed 'they' to 'then', which it should have been. Should it still take a semi-colon?

Thanks for you comments.Harrias talk 09:14, 9 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment

  • "Somerset, after drawing with Worcestershire, (their ninth draw in a row in the competition,) finished third in Division One" - You don't need the brackets and commas. --JP (Talk) 11:38, 10 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments.

  • In the first paragraph of "Background", the first two sentences talk about the county championship, and the next sentence jumps to one day cricket; the reader doesn't figure that out till halfway through that sentence. Could you rephrase to start that third sentence with "In one day cricket", in order to let the reader know the subject is changing?
  • Tweaked as suggested.
  • Third paragraph of "Background": does the Guardian cite also cover the "viewpoint shared by the Guardian" comment? You have "The Guardian" twice in short succession there; if the cite covers both, then perhaps a rephrase such as: "They identified spin bowling as an area of weakness following the departure of Blackwell.[10] Bob Willis, writing in The Guardian, shared this view, and predicted that Somerset would also be hindered by the difficulty of getting 20 wickets at home, resulting in too many draws.[11]"
  • Tweaked as suggested.
  • Are there fielding statistics kept that are of sufficient interest to be quoted in the article?
  • There are fielding statistics, but in my opinion they wouldn't really add too much to the article, Kieswetter's statistics as wicket-keeper were nothing special. Harrias talk
  • Why is the Natwest Pro40 section ahead of the Twenty20 section? The Twenty20 competition both started and finished before the NatWest Pro40, and putting these sections in chronological order would avoid the reader being confused on reading "Having performed well but missed out narrowly in both other one-day competitions in 2009", when to that point in the article only one one-day competition has been covered.
  • The two paragraphs at the top of the NatWest Pro40 section suffer, I think, from being in reverse chronological order; you give the outcome first and then review the matches, with the result that the last sentence refers to the first paragraph. I think it would be easier on the reader just to reverse the order of the two paragraphs and copyedit a little to make that flow.
  • I think the last paragraph of the Twenty20 section needs a little work. Reading the first sentence, I thought it was about the final, and it took me a second to realize that it was about the tactics for the whole competition. I'd either move this material up, or (probably better) make it clearer to the reader that the topic has shifted slightly.
  • When you quote Scyld Berry I think you should let readers know who he is: perhaps "Wisden editor Scyld Berry".
  • But that isn't his only role, this was written as part of his job as a cricket writer for the Daily Telegraph, not part of his job as Wisden editor. It might give more weight to his comments, so I guess it could be worth adding, but overall I'm a bit wary? Harrias talk 19:39, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    Fair enough -- all I'm saying is that the average reader has no idea who he is. "Cricket writer" or "cricket authority" or "Daily Telegraph cricket correspondent and Wisden editor" are all OK (well, that last one's a bit long); you just need to give the reader a reason to see Berry's opinion as authoritative. Mike Christie (talk) 19:56, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • You use a hyphen throughout in "first-innings" and "second-innings". I think this is arguably OK when it's an attributive use ("Langer's first-innings 107") but not when it's a straightforward noun use ("Durham scored 543 in their first-innings"). To be honest, I've never seen it hyphenated even in the attributive sense. Do any of your sources do this?
  • "a fact which Scyld Berry suggested was exposed in the final": this isn't quite right. It's a fact, but the fact wasn't exposed in the final; weaknesses get exposed, in this sense anyway. It could be "a weakness, according to Wisden editor Scyld Berry, which he felt was exposed in the final"; or "which Wisden editor Scyld Berry suggested was a weakness Sussex took advantage of in the final".

Overall a thorough and apparently comprehensive article. -- Mike Christie (talk) 14:05, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your comments, I've responded to a few and will look at the article and respond to the others when I'm feeling a little better (darn manflu!) Harrias talk 17:00, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Right, I think I've addressed all your points made so far, thanks for the thorough copyedit, my writing skills need some improvement yet! I'm reasonably happy with your reworking of the NatWest Pro40 section, the section possibly needs a slight expansion to fit with the format of the other sections though, I'm not sure. Harrias talk 10:39, 18 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. I've switched to support above. I've copyedited a little more; if I messed anything up please just change it. I dropped the Sussex Sharks from the lead just because it made it easier to make those sentences flow, and I didn't think it was critical. Nice work on the article -- are you planning to do a series of these? Once you get one right the others should be much easier (though pictures may become trickier for older seasons). Mike Christie (talk) 10:47, 18 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, some sort of series. Initially I'm only really looking at articles for notable seasons, for example, ones in which they win something, or come very close (such as this one). Then maybe later I'll fill in the gaps. Don't expect a whole host of them in a rush though, I flit around a lot with my article writing, my last two projects are early Somerset captains Stephen Newton and Herbie Hewett, which are both at GA, the latter of which I'd like to get up to FA at some point (though I'm lacking information on his later life after cricket at the moment). Harrias talk 11:06, 18 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Query The West Indies flag has been omitted presumably due to copyright issues, where & when was this flag created? Fasach Nua (talk) 20:17, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No idea to be honest. We used to use it, but then the image was deleted. There is some argument that it is free use, but noone can really find out enough about the image to be able to prove it! I don't remember where the discussion is though unfortunately. Harrias talk 20:19, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Here? Mike Christie (talk) 20:32, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I was thinking of this, particularly the Ireland section. To be honest, it's an issue I haven't put much effort into; copyrights and copyvios and free-use and fair-use is all far too technical and irritating to me, I'd rather get on and write articles! If someone gets the image on for free, then I'll use it, if not, there's an annoying gap! Harrias talk 20:43, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
A lack of clarity will be a needless fail of WP:FA Criteria 3 Fasach Nua (talk) 22:16, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at West_Indian_cricket_team_in_England_in_1900 and West_Indian_cricket_team_in_England_in_1906 there is a logo used, but is not resolvable in the images provided Fasach Nua (talk) 22:47, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support: I reviewed the article at GAN and it has improved since then. Prose seems OK and content very good. And the article looks great. Just a few minor points.

  • "in doing so made the earliest triple-century ever scored in an English season" Possibly clear up for non-cricketers to say "earliest date".
  • I'm not convinced that this would be confusing for a non-cricketer; I think it's pretty clear. Still, I'll have a look at some alternative language.
  • "Somerset were set a reduced target of 290 off 41 overs" Maybe add a note explaining about rain reduced targets. Non-cricketers probably won't have heard of Duckworth Lewis!
  • "A fourth-wicket partnership of 167, highlighted by powerful hitting from Kieswetter..." Not sure about highlighted. Led by? Dominated by? And it makes for a very long sentence.
  • Changed to dominated.
  • "ended just one over short of the requirement for a match..." Again needs explaining.
  • Is there an "official" review of the season, for example in the Yearbook? I know Yorkshire do something where the players are evaluated, the season summed up and there is a sense of oh well, maybe next year... If not, no problem.
  • Now you remind me? I have a quick flick through, and I find that the President, Chairman, Director of Cricket, Secretary and Captain all provide a couple of page spreads analysing the season. I'll see what is useful and will probably add some of it in.
  • The article may need a check from a non-cricketer as I may have missed some jargon/technical parts which are hard to follow if you aren't a fan. Other than that, no obvious problems. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:42, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
As always, thanks for your comments! Harrias talk 09:38, 23 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: Regarding the West Indies flag, I seem to remember around 2000 the board/players designed a new logo so that they could market it. So it's quite recent. And non-free. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:45, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Image review concern about File:Flag of South Africa.svg: Since all contents on the government site are copyrighted,[2] and South Africa's copyright law grants copyright to "every work which is eligible for copyright", "irrespective of the artistic quality". It lasts for "the life of the author and fifty years from the end of the year in which the author dies" or "continue to subsist for a period of fifty years from the end of the year" it was published (corporate or unknown authorship). Since the flag was designed in 1992 by Frederick Brownell, who is still alive, what disqualifies this flag design from copyright protection? And yes, flags are considered works of art eligible for copyright.[3] Jappalang (talk) 22:45, 26 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As stated above for the West Indies flag, I don't get involved too heavily in that sort of thing. Post this question on the discussion page of the file, and also on Commons maybe? Or even nominate it for deletion; that should ruffle enough feathers to get an answer! As far as I am aware, it has a valid copyright tag, and so I'll use it in this article. If that tag is shown to be invalid; I'll remove said image.Harrias talk 22:54, 26 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It turns out the flag's design was laid out in the country's Constitution, which is not copyrighted. All images okay. Jappalang (talk) 07:12, 28 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Note, I don't see a spotcheck for any reviewer on WP:V and WP:COPYVIO. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:27, 14 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Which in English means?... Harrias talk 21:08, 14 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I think Sandy's looking to see some evidence that some of the references verify the claims they're supposed to, and that there's no significant evidence of copyright violation. I'd be happy to take a look tomorrow if it helps? The Rambling Man (talk) 21:11, 14 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, also WP:Close paraphrase (Harrias, this is a new issue, since the mainpage of October 31 contained a copyvio, and we need to check more closely for that now). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:13, 14 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've done a check. Many of the refs are cricket scorecards and are fine. As these are statistical, they are not a problem for copyvio. Sample of online refs check out. I've also checked the text refs which I can access and these check out as well, although I had to slightly tweak a page ref in one of them. --Sarastro1 (talk) 21:15, 14 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Ah right; apologies, reading it back now my comment seems a bit rude, I didn't mean it like that! Harrias talk 21:17, 14 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Sarastro, that work is much appreciated! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:18, 14 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, concerns with quality of research, attribution, and close paraphrasing. On a high level, I'm concerned that this is largely a narrative told with statistics—there are relatively few prose-based sources used. As such, the article has a dearth of real analysis taken from secondary sources and is mostly a retelling of results and stats. I spot-checked several sources and found moderate problems with attribution as described below. More seriously, when you have used prose-based sources, you are prone to close paraphrasing, also illustrated below. This is a form of plagiarism.
    • Attribution problems:
      • The entire first para of the Background section is cited to p.711 of an almanac. Does that page include prose that supports the text you've written?
      • "Somerset promoted four players from their academy for the 2009 season, giving contracts to Jos Buttler, Adam Dibble, Chris Jones and James Burke. Of these, only Buttler appeared for the first-team during the season." This is all cited to the "County Championship Preview" article, which only really supports the first sentence. "Butler" is misspelled, and I see no support of the second sentence.
      • Second para of "Friends Provident Trophy" has only one citation, and the article linked doesn't seem to support everything you've written. I don't see any information in the source about "winning by eight wickets against Warwickshire and Middlesex" and so on.
    • Close paraphrasing:
      • Your text: "signed former England Under-19 fast bowler David Stiff, initially on a two-month contract"
      • Source text: "signed former England Under-19 fast bowler David Stiff on an initial two-month deal"
      • Your text: "Somerset would also be hindered by the difficulty of getting 20 wickets at home, resulting in too many draws"
      • Source text: "Getting 20 wickets at Taunton is not easy and Somerset's downfall could be too many draws"
        • I'm not sure of the problem here; I did state that this was Willis' prediction from that source, I'm not sure how I can alter it further without saying something different to him? Harrias talk 19:13, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • Your text: "the on-field umpires allowed Somerset too many powerplay overs"
      • Source text: "the on-field umpires [...] allowing Somerset [...] too many Powerplay overs"
      • Your text: "which should have seen them have 16 powerplay overs, but they instead had 19"
      • Source text: "That should have meant they had 16 Powerplay overs but the umpires permitted them 19."
--Andy Walsh (talk) 17:17, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If I fix these referencing issues will you still be opposed based on the fact it is "largely a narrative told with statistics—there are relatively few prose-based sources used. As such, the article has a dearth of real analysis taken from secondary sources and is mostly a retelling of results and stats" ? (Though I will do anyway, because I'd like the article to be as good as I can get it, even if I can't write prosaicly enough! Harrias talk 18:52, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Just a quick comment on the close paraphrasing concerns. I checked some of the online refs (above) but didn't see any problems myself, so I'd like to clarify for my own peace of mind! Of the ones mentioned above by Laser brain, the first one is quite close, although there are few ways to say "former England Under-19 fast bowler David Stiff". However, the second one does not look close to me as "too many draws" cannot really be said any other way. As Harrias said, the third is mainly factual and is pretty standard cricket phrasing as is the powerplay stuff in the final one. If these are really a problem, I'll strike my comment on sourcing above. The whole copyvio thing looks a minefield, and I want to make sure it's all OK. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:24, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've avoided making similar (to Sarastro1) comment, but agree. There aren't too many ways to state a statistic. I also feel that if this becomes an issue with sports-related FACs, then I'd like to dodge the minefield as well. Perhaps alternative phrasing for these "plagiaristic comments" could be suggested? The Rambling Man (talk) 20:26, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I empathize, believe me. Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing is a very good introduction to the topic, and stresses the importance of significant paraphrasing to avoid copyright violation. I grant you the second example might be okay in some camps. The rest of my examples are way too close for comfort, and we need to rewrite them. Plagiarism is a scary word, but in my experience it's mostly unintentional and just comes from following along with sources as you type, or copying text over and altering it. I understand that if a sports writer writes "Johnson scored 100 runs in a match" you can pretty much drive yourself batty (har har) trying to invent new ways of phrasing it. But, that doesn't excuse us of the responsibility to paraphrase appropriately. If we do that, no minefield. --Andy Walsh (talk) 20:40, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yep. Can I try an example? "signed former England Under-19 fast bowler David Stiff, initially on a two-month contract" perhaps "signed David Stiff, fast bowler and former England Under-19 representative, on an initial two-month contract"? The Rambling Man (talk) 20:43, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"Fast bowler David Stiff, coming from the England Under-19 team, joined the team under a two-month contract" is better; structure and order of facts altered. --Andy Walsh (talk) 20:58, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
While this is being sorted, it's probably better if I strike my comments above as I seem to have missed some! --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:59, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Just me perhaps, but "coming from" is far from BritEng, particularly when talking about cricketers, and he didn't "join the team" he signed a contract... that's why this is a minefield I guess.... ! The Rambling Man (talk) 21:04, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
No, I see your point. We don't want to make this minefield. The problem is, academically, plagiarism is simply an ethical issue. But here, if we use someone else's words too closely, they can literally file a copyright violation claim. I clearly have no idea how to write about cricket, but I think we're getting closer to the paraphrasing issue. --Andy Walsh (talk) 21:11, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Lame as it was, how would my rephrase work per your concerns? The Rambling Man (talk) 21:16, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I think so, yes. Off to the Harry Potter opening now, will revisit in a bit. In the mean time, if anyone else wants to spot-check other online references, that would be helpful. --Andy Walsh (talk) 22:57, 18 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Update I've checked several of the other refs and didn't find additional problems with attribution or close paraphrasing. Like I said, very easy to do unintentionally. Are there any cricket folks watching that can speak to the sources used? Is the feeling that additional prose-based sources are not available? I've stricken my opposition above, but need to look closer at the writing. --Andy Walsh (talk) 04:53, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • Wisden provides a written summary of the season and of each County Championship match, and the Somerset yearbook provides similar, and as I commented above in reply to Sarastro, there are the views of the director of cricket, chairman etc. Harrias talk 09:10, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • The sources are fine. All the print sources checked out and I had another look after Laser brain's comments on close paraphrasing and I could not find any problems no matter how hard I looked. One page ref needed tweaking. Most online sources have come from CricketArchive or Cricinfo, which are the best sites available, using statisticians and journalists. Newspapers tend to carry previews, reviews and individual match reports, and these have been used where appropriate. The best (and only) print sources available have mainly been used. Wisden, as Harrias says, has a double page report on a season and then a paragraph on every match played. There is probably more that could be added on particular matches or performances, but I tend to agree with Harrias' approach as adding too much detail on each match would bog the article down and the reports tend to concentrate on individual achievements. There are also general reports in Wisden on each competition and the teams' performances in them. Other print sources would include the county yearbook, which is like an end-of-term report from the people in charge at the county (which may arguably be slanted, although in practise tend to be too harsh). This is the only thing which may improve the article's sourcing. Everything else tends to be stats based and covered elsewhere, for example Playfair Cricket Annuals. There are other reviews of the season available but tend to be lower quality as Wisden is the "gold standard". Nothing else would be available yet on such a recent season as no players biographies would mention it yet. Sorry for the long reply, hope it helps!--Sarastro1 (talk) 10:13, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
Retrieved from "https://wiki.riteme.site/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/Somerset_County_Cricket_Club_in_2009/archive1&oldid=1138471730"