Talk:Geelong Football Club

Coaches list
I have created a Geelong FC coaches list. (List of Geelong Football Club coaches) feel free to add or edit because their are coaches prior to 1910 missing. Sge 15:41, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Club's History
I have been looking at the sport featured articles (Chelsea FC, Central Coast Mariners, Sydney Roosters) and it has come to my attention that all of these pages follow the same layout. This layout includes a summery of the clubs history with a separate page devoted to a more detailed history. I was wondering if this would be a a good idea to do to the GFC History section because it has become quite long. Any thoughts on this? Sge 03:27, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I have long agreed with this idea - the current history run down here is far too cluttered and detailed. It needs to be cut down significantly, with a great portion made separate in another article. Boomtish (talk) 06:29, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

TAKE OFF!!!! THE VFA PREMIERSHIPS FROM THE MAIN RIGHT HAND BOX UNDER CLUB DETAILS (I'M A GEELONG SUPPORTER)OTHER CLUBS DON'T HAVE THEM LISTED AS PREMIERSHIPS IT'S A CLUB RECORD AND PART OF OUR HISTORY BUT THEY DO NOT DESERVE TO BE LISTED AS LEAGUE TITLES EVEN THOUGH YOU'VE MADE THE DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN VFL/AFL AND VFA. WE HAVE 9 VFL/AFL FLAGS AS THEY'RE IN THE SAME CONTINUOUS LEAGUE. THE VFA IS NOT APART OF SAID LEAGUE. BY ALL MEANS LIST THE 7 VFA FLAGS DOWN WHERE THE RECORDS ARE LISTED BUT NOT IN THE MAIN BOX. IT JUST LOOKS MESSY AND GIVES TO MUCH ACKNOWLEDGMENT TO THE VFA PREMIERSHIPS BY HAVING THEM IN THE MAIN BOX. I DON'T KNOW HOW TO TAKE THEM OUT SO YOU MUST DO THIS. GIVING YOU A WEEK. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.50.222.114 (talk) 06:37, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Broadening scope of article
This article concentrates almost exclusively on the on-field fortunes of GFC.

The club is also a political, social, cultural and financial entity.

GFC has had some difficult moments with VFL/AFL administrations, notably the question of GFC's readmission to the VFL after WWII.

GFC has had a unique relationship with the local community.

GFC has a club culture and identity that is firmly established in the public mind.

GFC has had unique challenges in keeping the club viable financially.

I think the entry on Richmond Football Club treats related issues well.

I'm suggesting that the GFC entry use that one as a model for covering these issues.

--TrackerGee (talk) 04:28, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Inappropriate tone
The tone of this article is far too informal for an encyclopedia, hence why I have added the tag. For example (and these are just a few, there are dozens within the article): It reads like a blog written by a football fan, not an encyclopedia article. There are also many statements that need referencing. Anyway, just wanted to highlight areas for improvement. Somno (talk) 04:21, 19 June 2008 (UTC)
 * "To celebrate its good fortune, Geelong buried a toy bomber in the Kardinia Park turf. This comical ceremony..."
 * "In 1981 Geelong's finals campaign inflicted more heartbreak."
 * "In the pre-season of 1988, in a foretaste of approaching frustrations"
 * "Geelong kicked mammoth scores"
 * "However, the Gary Ablett show had not even started yet"
 * "Hawthorn stole the match to win by two points. The loss against the Eagles was by a little more lop-sided. Once again, Geelong fell short."
 * "in the second half West Coast's Peter Matera ran riot, booting five goals"
 * "As Ablett walked back to take his kick, the siren went"
 * "To add insult to injury, former Geelong player Greg Williams, now a superstar at Carlton"
 * "a decision involving a fantastic mark to Leigh Colbert may have turned the game as the mark wasn't paid"
 * "The season proved fruitful"
 * "Geelong finally managed to entice shy Modewarre player"
 * "Geelong thrashed Melbourne by 55 points"

Opinions wanted
I've done a bit of work on this article in the past week or so, and I intend to do a lot more because I'd like to try to push it up to A-class or even Featured Article quality. As far as I can see the article is well organized and adequately sourced. There's still some tweaking to be done, but I think the major problem is the extensive History section.

Much of it has POV issues; as Somno quite rightly says, it reads like a blog written by a fan. I could tone down the adulation but it might not be worth the effort because I think much of it should be torn down and built up again from scratch. We currently have twelve seperate subsections of the History section, each covering a decade or a year, and few are more than a few paragraphs. It looks ugly and disproportionate.

But before I plunge in with my pruning shears and big red pen, and start making wholesale changes, I thought I'd run it past the rest of you and ask for opinions on how best this bit could be improved. Reyk YO!  08:09, 29 July 2008 (UTC)


 * One thing I should note that I personally believe needs to be addressed, is the length of the article. There is really no need to provide a running commentary of every season to date. Look at other sporting team FA like Arsenal F.C. or Aston Villa F.C., they each cover the history of the club well enough in the respective section of their articles, without going over the top. One thing to note is the use of separate articles to cover more comprehensively each specific season. I feel this needs to be done with this article, particularly given the long history of the Geelong Football Club. Aside from that, main issues are prose, POV, and sourcing. I'm happy to help get this article up to scratch. Cheers Boomtish (talk) 13:27, 29 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Agree with everything said above; I think starting the history section again will give the article a stronger base to work from. I'm also happy to help, I just didn't want to tackle the article by myself 'cause it's so long! I have access to databases so may be able to access some helpful older info for sourcing. Somno (talk) 14:10, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I think we could divide the history section into fewer, but longer, subsections. Perhaps something like this: I'm not so much concerned that the article is long, long articles are good, it's just that too much weight is given to some areas and not enough to others. If it still turns out that the history section is too long then we should think about splitting it into a seperate article as Boomtish suggests. As it stands, the everything after about 1950 is covered in tedious and excessive detail and needs to be pruned, while the info on Geelong in early years of the VFL is pretty sparse. In particular, Geelong's wartime troubles need to be covered in more detail. Do your sources have enough info on this stuff, Somno? Reyk YO!  22:35, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Founding of the Club - Formation of the VFL
 * 1897 - WWII
 * WWII - National expansion in 1987
 * 1987 to Today
 * Hmm, now that I look, the first database doesn't go as far back for Aussie topics (I've gone back to the '50s for British stuff). The earliest Cats article is from 1989, with interesting sentences such as "Like their kindred spirits in Newcastle, Wollongong and Canberra, Geelong folk enjoy nothing more than putting people from the big smoke in their place." Perhaps that article was written by whoever wrote the History section of this one! I'll keep looking - I'm sure there must be recent articles that discuss those times. Somno (talk) 03:47, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I have access to a book 'The Clubs' that details every VFL/AFL club's history. Would serve as a nice external source as well I would think. I still do strongly believe that the history section needs to be pruned down significantly. Boomtish (talk) 03:56, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Does anyone have access to The Road to Kardinia: The Story of the Geelong Football Club, 1996, Russell H. T. Stephens, Playright Publishing? Somno (talk) 03:59, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I haven't. I've got the following:
 * Every Game Ever Played(1983) by Stephen Rodgers
 * Cats on the Prowl
 * Year of the Cat
 * Gary Ablett Unauthorised Biography
 * Reyk YO!  04:22, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Are we scratching the History section? If so, where should we draft a replacement? What sort of information/level of detail should we include? Somno (talk) 06:32, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Reyk YO!  23:16, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I've set up a subpage here:


 * Somno, regarding this bit During the 1923 season a black cat came onto the ground during a game between Collingwood and Hawthorn, are you sure that's supposed to be Hawthorn? IIRC they didn't join the league until 1925. Reyk  YO!  02:28, 31 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Oops, that's supposed to Collingwood Juniors and Hawthorn Juniors. Somno (talk) 02:43, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I thought the mentions of burying objects under Corio/Kardinia in the history section were urban legends, but it is verified in an article in The Herald-Sun. The article from last year is about what Geelong could bury if they beat Port in the grand final the following week. Is this tradition worthy of mention, or a crufty item? Somno (talk) 05:27, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

So what did they bury? A battery?? Lasiorhinus (talk) 05:45, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

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Club Song
Are the lyrics of the team song copyright? I remember there used to be a page with all the team's songs that was deleted due to the lyrics being copyrighted, but I don't know if there are some individual clubs that may no longer have copyrighted lyrics. Morstar (talk) 12:32, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Yerp, the copyright is granted automatically (under the Berne Convention) and exists for the period until the death of the author + 70 years. So it'll expire seventy years after John Watts dies. The use of the lyrics on this page should be fine. Take a look at Wikipedia's current policy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Non-free_content#Policy. timothykhoo (talk) 20:53, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Notable Players
I'm not sure about that list. It's entirely subjective as it stands. It might be good to have some loose definitions on what constitutes notable...Multiple premierships & awards (i.e., Jimmy Bartel), achievements outside of GFC or AFL... etc. I don't think Damien Drum is of more note than some players who have not made that list.

I've added Bobby Davis and Jimmy Bartel, and removed references to notable players being "Players." It may be worth scrapping the section altogether, as a lot of FA club pages don't have a comparable section. That said, I think it is a nice way for people to get acquainted with characters from the club, albeit an incomplete list. (Refusetm (talk) 15:40, 11 June 2012 (UTC))

Mark Thompson
It says Mark Thompson is to quit in the info box. I though he had quit, when he announced his resignation yesterday? --124.176.156.21 (talk) 09:21, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Guernsey
That guernsey looks pretty ordinary and the blue is certainly far lighter than the navy actually in use. Hoever06 (talk) 00:06, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

"currently trading as Geelong Cats"
Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the Geelong Football Club currently officially trading as the "Geelong Cats"? Look at the Western Bulldogs page to see how this should be formatted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.107.71.45 (talk) 12:44, 3 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Is there a source that tells us that the club is currently officially trading as the "Geelong Cats"? HiLo48 (talk) 13:14, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Ever since the GFC hit, they have moved away from using GFC officially. However, common usage is still to refer to them as Geelong, Geelong Football Cats or The Cats.  This is very different to the Western Bulldogs, who completely changed their name, similar to what the Kangaroos did.  Fremantle also, once the Levi's restriction ended, started using Fremantle Dockers more often.  But the official AND common names remain as the XXX Football Club, so these pages should remain where they are.  And most long term fans hate the Name Nickname style, as it makes it sound American, which is a bad thing for most people over 40 years old. The-Pope (talk) 14:15, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Yep. They are "Geelong", or "the Cats", but not the "Geelong Cats". HiLo48 (talk) 03:38, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

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Handbaggers
The cats were once called the Handbaggers. That is an officials former nickname. HandbaggerCat (talk) 07:43, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
 * No it's not. HiLo48 (talk) 07:46, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Not to my knowledge, please prove it with a reference.  - Yours Faithfully, GA Melbourne ( T | C )  08:06, 21 October 2022 (UTC)