Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Len Hutton/archive1


 * 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 promoted by Ian Rose 10:28, 28 February 2012.

Len Hutton

 * Nominator(s): Sarastro1 (talk) 21:30, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Len Hutton was arguably one of the most important cricketers of the 20th century; one of England's best batsmen and the first professional to captain England officially, he also remains the holder of the highest Test innings by an England player. There was also plenty of controversy thrown in, mostly not of his making. I have been working on this article for a long time now. It is currently a GA and received a peer review recently. Brianboulton has also provided excellent comments and performed a copy-edit. I am aware that the article is on the long side but Hutton packed more than most into his career and I'm not sure too much more could be cut down and still keep it comprehensive. All comments gratefully received. Sarastro1 (talk) 21:30, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Comments Only had a quick look of this, will post more if I have the time:
 * Ref 2 is dead.
 * "and he wrote for The News of the World", does 'The' need to be capitalised? Wikilink should be on 'News of the World'. – Lemonade51 (talk) 13:25, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Both done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 21:45, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Comments – Have reviewed through the Leading batsman sub-section so far...
 * Remove second "the" from "he was the mainstay of the England's batting."
 * "and did so for the remained of his career." "remained" → "remainder". Don't particularly like seeing two glaring prose issues in the lead, where they should have been spotted already.
 * Early life: I see Joseph Verity and Verity's here. Does the name have the 's at the end, or is the latter usage missing a word afterward?
 * Test record score: Excess comma after "Hutton maintained caution throughout".
 * Series against South Africa and West Indies: "two days its conclusion, the Second World War began." Needs an "after" before "its", I believe.
 * First tour in Australia: "Nevertheless, he scored scored 1,552 runs at an average of 48.50." Double word in there.
 * Series against South Africa and West Indies: "Hutton played immediately he arrived against British Guiana". Could perhaps use another "after". Giants2008  ( Talk ) 02:41, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * All done. Thanks for the comments so far. --Sarastro1 (talk) 10:15, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Leading batsman: Add "the" in "followed by 123 in fourth game".
 * Australia 1950–51: "under the captaincy of the amateur Brown. Brown...". Try to avoid this repetition from one sentence to the next.
 * Ashes victory: In "Hutton was retained by English captain", is "by" intended to be "as"?
 * Batting: "He was The official Yorkshire history describes him...". First two words should be chopped.
 * Redundancy in "One such innings was his innings of 37...".
 * For consistency, a space is needed between the page numbers and pp. in ref 26. Giants2008  ( Talk ) 02:44, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
 * All done, I think. --Sarastro1 (talk) 18:08, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Support Leaning to Support : I did a long post-PR review which is to be found on the talkpage, and would like to see what other reviewers have to say before committing myself to full support. My general view is that the article is close to, if not already fulfilling, the FA criteria; maybe a few more brisk prose tweaks (I just did one myself), but not much else required? After further adjustments during this process I am convinced the article is eady for promotion now. The quality of WP cricket articles is definitely on the up, in no small measure due to Sarastro (who with a name like that really ought to be writing opera articles). Brianboulton (talk) 19:57, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * (added comment and strikes) Brianboulton (talk) 22:06, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Much obliged for the help and kind remarks. --Sarastro1 (talk) 13:05, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Source review - spotchecks not done. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Missing bibliographic info for Hodgson
 * Be consistent in whether you provide locations for books
 * Be consistent in whether page notation includes a space or not
 * FN 40: ISBN?
 * Check for wikilinking consistency
 * Be consistent in which locations include counties. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks. All done, I think. --Sarastro1 (talk) 00:37, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Image review
 * Suggest removing "learned his cricket" from caption
 * File:Hutton.jpg: "unique historic image" use requires that the photo itself is the subject of commentary. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:04, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Done, I think. --Sarastro1 (talk) 01:24, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Yep, better. Nikkimaria (talk) 22:39, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Provisional support – All of my comments above have been resolved and I believe this meets the FA criteria. The only reason this is provisional is that I want to see an image review check out before switching to a full support. Giants2008  ( Talk ) 03:04, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Support – Sorry, didn't see that an image review was already done. Switching to full support. Giants2008  ( Talk ) 14:02, 23 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Support Comments  beginning a read through now. Will copyedit as I go (please revert any changes which guff the meaning), and jot notes below...Casliber (talk · contribs) 05:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 *  Marked out as a potential star from his teenage years, Hutton made his debut for Yorkshire in 1934 and quickly established himself - as a.....damn the sentence just seems to end. I think if we could reword it, it'd read nicer.....
 * Reworked slightly. Better? --Sarastro1 (talk) 19:18, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * yup Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:13, 23 February 2012 (UTC)


 *  including an innings of 271, and a partnership of 315 with Sutcliffe - does Howat mention the games these came in? Were they the same or different? Mentioning them would be a good way of showing the reader (I also like promoting state/county games :))
 * Done; both games in the same week, actually, which I included. --Sarastro1 (talk) 19:18, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Otherwise looking good. Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:16, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the comments so far. --Sarastro1 (talk) 19:18, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Comments
 * "established himself. ... established himself" in the lead is repetitive.
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "the amateurs who ran English cricket" could be read two ways! Can you clarify who "ran English cricket"?
 * Excellent point, which I fixed, but also made me realise the article did not really talk about the amateur-professional class thing going on at the time. I've added a couple of sentences to clarify this in the captaincy section for the benefit of readers unfamiliar with cricket sociology in the 1950s! --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I wonder if it's not too crass to add a link to Test cricket records somewhere in the article?
 * Not a huge fan of this idea, unless you can suggest a good place to put it? --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "county batsman" vs "County cap", is there a reason the second county is capitalised?
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "his first two innings were failures" this may be a little tough for non-cricket types to grasp... can it be quantified?
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "to prevent his overexposure to Championship cricket" maybe you don't know the answer to this, but what would have been wrong with him playing Championship cricket all the time?
 * The source states that the committee were "nurturing their young plant", but not why; the only other possible source for this is Hutton's first autobiography but there is no real reason here either as I imagine it was obvious to them: to prevent burnout or damage to his confidence or technique. But no source to say this that I can find, unless I've overlooked something. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "he had scored only 73 runs in total" perhaps "scored a total of just 73 runs"?
 * Changed, but don't see much difference myself. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "Selected for a Test trial" quickly followed by "selected for the first Test " is a little monotonous.
 * Perhaps, but I can't see a way around it here. The Test trial needs to be called that to avoid ambiguity, and it needs to be specified that he was selected for a Test match (just saying first game against NZ would not work without some tortuous construction to say it was a match for England, not Yorkshire or anyone else). --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "he surpassed the previous highest Test score by an England batsman in a home match." is that referenced somewhere?
 * Yes, in the ref from Wisden at the end of the sentence. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "On the third day (23 August)" so they had a rest day? Worth noting?  Ah, "Next day, the Yorkshire batsmen "... it looks like, according to the scorecard, it wasn't the next day, they had the 21st as a rest day...
 * Fixed, and well spotted. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "in all matches 1,874 runs " if it were me, I'd have "1,874 runs in all matches..."
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "supposedly "timeless" Test - when he scored 364, that was also "timeless" right? Would consider talking about that earlier?
 * It does actually say so when mentioning Hutton's slow scoring. I'm not sure it is worth saying more as the article is already long without something fairly minor being clarified. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Just out of interest, could you use Cricinfo's Statguru to list out his batting performances being specific about whether they were for Test matches or county matches etc using filters? I find that Cricketarchive page quite unhelpful!
 * All his Test innings are referenced to Statsguru; but that database doesn't cover county games. The Cricketarchive page could be filtered in this way, but there is no way that I know of to link to the results, and so the only way is the complete list page used here. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Should "high profile" be hyphenated?
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "which lost the four-Test series 2–0 and failed to win a single match" the second part is obvious from the first unless you're referring to the entire tour (which may have included other matches?), in which case it's not clear.
 * Clarified. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "Miller bowled him " forgive me, can you just ensure you linked "bowled" in this context?
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Feel free to link Bill O'Reilly!
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "as astonishing" should that astonishment be in quotes?
 * Not sure it matters, but did so to be on the safe side. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "in 1951 with " personal preference but "in the 1951 season with..." would be better for me, linking "1951 season" instead of just the year.
 * Actually, I thought I'd unlinked all the seasons as I find it rather annoying when all the seasons are linked for no obvious reason. So I unlinked this one. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "against Nottinghamshire and " I believe this to be one of the only (if not, the only) time you link an opposition county cricket club. I was going to ask why you hadn't linked them all, but now I'm having to ask why you'd link just that one?!
 * They are all linked, but only on their first mention, so the links may be at various points throughout. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * "a fast rate of scoring." I know that, you know that, but prove it!
 * Removed. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:31, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Note 1 could use reference.
 * Done (I think). --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:31, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Ref 146 could use an author and a publication date.
 * Changed it to a more up-to-date one anyway. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:31, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Ref 228 could use a publication date.
 * Done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:31, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Never keen on the succession boxes, really don't think they're necessary, but if you're going to keep them, en-dash required for the year range as England captain.
 * Nor am I, took it out.


 * Don't need Category:English cricketers (already covered by more specific categories).
 * OK, done. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:31, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

The Rambling Man (talk) 11:34, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * ICC HoF and Wisden COTY awards are mentioned in the categories but not in the text. These are pretty prestigious awards...
 * CoY is mentioned (it was early in his career). I would argue that in the context of Hutton's career, HoF is not prestigious enough to include, to be honest. Given the relative quality of players included, I don't think this says much about him. The World XI selection would seem to give more weight to his "position". And as the article is so long, I'm not keen to include the relatively trivial award.
 * Thanks for the review and comments so far. --Sarastro1 (talk) 20:31, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Support nothing outstanding that I feel should stop me supporting the article. Good work. The Rambling Man (talk) 07:48, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the support. --Sarastro1 (talk) 15:29, 26 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Support: TRM brought up most of the issues that I had, saves me the effort, eh! One minor point, more a personal preference really: wouldn't "before and after the Second World War.." be better written as "either side of the Second World War.."? As usual, really nice work on this article.  Harrias  talk 22:39, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I think, unless others object, I prefer the current sentence, as "side" when referring to the war can have confusing connotations! Thanks for the support. --Sarastro1 (talk) 15:29, 26 February 2012 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.