Wikipedia:WikiProject Rugby union/Style

Whilst naming and editing rugby union-related articles, editors often encounter recurring questions of style. Project Wikipedia:WikiProject Rugby union/Participants have agreed to the following style guidelines to keep a consistent look and feel to rugby union articles throughout Wikipedia. These styles also fall within the WP:MOS guidelines and WP:NC policies.

Naming Conventions

 * Rugby union should be written in lower case, such as rugby union, except when starting a sentence, such as in this one. (Similarly, rugby positions should also be in lower case, for example “flanker”, not “Flanker”).
 * "Union" should follow rugby to differentiate it from rugby league. Exceptions to this include when the title of the article is commonly known by the shortened form (e.g."Rugby World Cup" not "Rugby union world cup") or for some common descriptions (such as "champagne rugby" or "counter-attacking rugby" not "champagne rugby union" or "counter-attacking rugby union"
 * The use of "rugby union players" is preferable over the more regional/archaic "rugby union footballers".

Upcoming and recent fixtures
There have been various discussions over the years as to whether recent and upcoming fixture lists should be included or removed from national rugby team articles. These discussions have occurred on the WP:RU talk page in 2007, in 2014 and again in 2014, and then in 2018, as well as on national team talk pages (Canada 2014). Most of these discussions have involved a small number of participants, usually with opposing viewpoints, and no clear consensus has emerged.

As such, there is no uniform requirement that all national rugby team articles include these sections, nor that they be removed from all articles. These sections can be included in articles at the option of editors working on those articles as long as they are kept reasonably up to date.

Succession boxes
Succession boxes should be avoided for team article pages as per this discussion. Consensus among project members has been reached that such information as tournament or trophy victories should be included in the article, and certain cases (such as the Rugby World Cup) the team's infobox.

Summarise and link
Particularly when writing history of rugby union, be careful not to duplicate information. The standard way to deal with possibly duplicate information is to keep one major source of that information and wherever else it is useful, summarise and link to it, in the following manner.


 * 1) Place the link under the heading of the section you are writing and before any text.
 * 2) Use, like this  . It will appear like this:
 * 3) If necessary or relevant, also link to a specific section in the article

You can see an example here.

However, it may be that yours is a complicated subject and for the reader to get the whole picture with as little reading as possible, it is recommended you write light paragraphs that link to the relevant articles in the text.

Nationality in player biographies
As a general rule, rugby player biographies often describe the player's nationality in the first sentence of the article. This is good practice, and presents no issues as long as the player's nationality is clear.

Dual Nationalities
In some cases, reasonable editors may disagree on how to characterize a player's nationality. For example, a player may be born and raised in one country, but then moves and later players for the national team of his adopted country. In these cases, editors should avoid subjectively characterizing the player's nationality or emphasizing one nationality over the other, as this would violate WP:POV.
 * Red x.svg Rory Kockott (born 25 June 1986) is a South African rugby union player who plays for France."
 * Red x.svg Rory Kockott (born 25 June 1986) is a French rugby union player who plays for France."

The better practice is to mention together in the lead both the country of birth and the country they play for in an objective way; this can be done together in the lead sentence, or together later in the lead section.
 * Green check.svg Rory Kockott (born 25 June 1986) is a South African-born rugby union player who plays for the France national rugby union team."
 * Green check.svg Rory Kockott (born 25 June 1986) is a rugby union player who plays as scrum-half. He was born and raised in South Africa, but after moving to France, plays for the France national rugby union team after qualifying on residency grounds."

Dual Nationalities — Exception
Some players have no meaningful ties to their birth country, other than the fact that they were born there and lived there very briefly during early childhood. In these situations, the best practice is to mention only the player's principal nationality in the lead; birth country should not be mentioned in the lead paragraph, as it would give WP:UNDUE weight to that aspect.
 * Red x.svg Ronan O'Gara (born 7 March 1977) is an American-born Irish former rugby union player, who played fly-half for Ireland.
 * Green check.svg Ronan O'Gara (born 7 March 1977) is an Irish former rugby union player, who played fly-half for Ireland.

Images, Templates, Infoboxes
Rugby union-related images can be browsed at: Rugby union related articles needing images can be found at:
 * Images
 * Category:Rugby union images -- for all rugby union related images, with sub-categories for more accurate sorting.
 * Category:Rugby union articles needing photographs


 * Templates
 * See Templates and Infoboxes for all rugby union templates, as well as infoboxes.

Flags
When using flags to indicate the players IRB nationality in teams containing players from multiple nationalities for example the Barbarians or in club squad templates the flag of the union at the time of the match should be used not the flag at the time of the players birth for example this is incorrect but this is correct

Exceptions
The following are exceptions to this

Ireland
Due to copyright we can't use the current flag but we can use the flag used in the 30s here. This flag should be used for all articles related Irish rugby even prior to 1925

Japan and Fiji
Japan's and Fiji's flags have experienced minor changes over the life time of Rugby football but in the contexts of rugby union the difference doesn't matter

Wales
The current Welsh flag was not official until 1959. However, it is fine to use it for rugby union articles.

Referencing
When adding information/statistics, particularly regarding popularity, be sure to add a reference, by adding this after it (using the IRB as an example):

'' '

or for a news site:

 


 * Be sure to change all the names, publishers, titles, urls, and access dates to your specific reference.

Then, put a references section at the bottom of the page, but not below the external links. Like this:

''