Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cricket/Archive 31

Teesra
Can someone check the validity of this article? It is not written very well and seems to be only be based on one source. GizzaChat  &#169; 09:18, 5 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Aha. This article is from before the Indian tour of Pakistan in 2004 and this so called 'teesra' was a subject of numerous jokes in messageboards at the time. The special thing about this ball was that after pitching infront of the batsman (usually Sehwag) it used to land in the crowd. Saqlain scored a double century in 43 overs as a bowler in that match and hasn't played Tests since. Tintin 10:02, 5 April 2007 (UTC)


 * It's a shame Sehwag couldn't continue sending balls into the crowd during the World Cup and in other matches recently. :) I wonder whether the article should be AFD'd, especially since I doubt anyone will try to bowl it ever again. GizzaChat  &#169; 10:47, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
 * He is too fat to be of any use now :-) Bowlers boasting about mystery deliveries is nothing new (Kaneria has talked about his at least on two seperate occasions) and IMO, there is no need for an article unless the bowler has something to show for his claim and the term comes into common use. Neither is true here. Tintin 11:39, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Infobox Cricketer update fields
I'm proposing some additional fields to Infobox Cricketer.


 * 1) Date of birth: (with the use of birth date and age which automatically calculates and inserts a player's age.
 * 2) Date of death: (if necessary)
 * 3) Status. I'm thinking of using coloured icons (active, semi-active, retired)

=Nichalp  «Talk»=  05:43, 31 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I support it, go ahead looks like a good idea--Thugchildz 06:17, 31 March 2007 (UTC)


 * First two sound fine, but I'd like to see an example of the status icons before I lend them my support. →Ollie (talk • contribs) 09:40, 31 March 2007 (UTC)


 * I like putting the dates of birth and death in the infobox, but I don't like the sound of the status icons.
 * Also, what happens if the date of birth isn't given (as will be the case for all cricketers to start with)?
 * Maybe you could make some samples for us to look at.
 * Stephen Turner (Talk) 18:48, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, if the date of birth isn't available then have it so that it doesn't show up, using "If codes" so its not necessary--Thugchildz 23:26, 31 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Like one and two. Per Ollie, like to see a sample for #3. Cheers,  Daniel Bryant  07:15, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I'm dropping my call for the status activity. Can the other two be added please? Regards, =Nichalp   «Talk»=  06:55, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I'd still like to see a sample of the layout for #1 and #2. Stephen Turner (Talk) 08:30, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
 * See Mandy Moore (living) and Elvis Presley (deceased) {[tl|Infobox musical artist}}. =Nichalp   «Talk»=  08:42, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

The Ashes
Although I've been in this project for some time, I've never before come across in which I see that The Ashes is  Definitive. Outstanding, thorough article; a great source for encyclopedic information . Someone is pulling our legs here!

The Ashes article is littered with "please expand" tags and rightly so, especially in terms of the series overviews.

To improve the article, concentrate on the urn and its origin and the so-called "legend" but leave the series overviews right out of it apart from supplying links to the appropriate England v Australia categories.

In fact, reading the article without the series overviews, it is actually very good. So there is the way forward. --BlackJack | talk page 18:11, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

I think there should be some series overviews in there. Think about how the article will be used in practise by surfers using wikipedia. Anyone looking up the 'ashes' is going to be a generalist, someone who just wants a broad picture of the whole thing, not some a hard core cricket nut like us looking for a specific and perhaps obscure detail. If the article doesn't give some flavour of the series in the past that surfer is going to miss out and not know where to look for further details. There's nothing wrong with some series highlights in an article which then encourages a general reader to seek more specific detail on a dedicated page. If the article is just about the urn then a casual reader will wonder what all the fuss is about. It's not like Wikipedia is going to run out of space. The beauty of this place is that it's not limited to a certain number of sheets of paper. What matters is that it's useful to the readers. Nick mallory 01:17, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Muttiah Muralitharan
I have just tried to add a comment to the talk page of this article and have come up against a spam filter block that will not allow me to save: see this!

I do not believe this is a legitimate block especially as the page is somewhat controversial. Can one of you with admin functions please investigate and report what is going on here? Thanks. --BlackJack | talk page 19:42, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * It's okay, there was a rogue website quoted earlier in the page so I removed the reference an dit now works. --BlackJack | talk page 21:45, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Importance ratings
BlackJack seems to be systematically working his way through those cricket articles that were rated Top, reducing their rating to Mid without giving any reasons. I don't see how one can justify rating, for example, Jack Hobbs, George Harris and Bodyline as low as Mid, unless one isn't going to have any Top rated cricket articles at all. We are surely talking about their importance in the context of cricket, not in a wider context. Even The Ashes has been reduced to High. If I sound cross, it's because I am. I've been sceptical about importance ratings for some time, as they are usually the (inevitably subjective) opinion of one individual. Perhaps we need a scheme that would allow people to vote on ratings, rather than be a single person's idea? JH (talk page) 19:44, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I've calmed down a little now. Lookimng at the assessment criteris, they seem to provide some justification for what BlackJack has done, but what that says to me is that there's something wrong with the criteria if applying them goes against common sense. How can WG Grace be anything less than Top importance? JH (talk page) 19:52, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Things are either notable (in which case they can have an article) or not (in which case they shouldn't be in there at all). But if people want to have fun with different shades of notability, then let them: you can choose either to join them or to ignore them. Me? I've just finished adding a few words to User:Nick mallory's stub on Roy Booth and fleetingly Booth was the most important cricketer of all time for me. I recognise that that judgement is subjective and transitory: but his notability won't change. :) Johnlp 20:11, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

WG Grace is clearly top importance, I don't see how anyone could argue otherwise. One I've spotted that I also disagree with is the downgrading of Bart King to mid-importance from high-importance. As by far the best American cricketer ever, I think there is clearly a case of him being high-importance. Andrew nixon 20:23, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

The rating guidelines include:
 * National captains - Generally classed as high importance. Grace and Harris were both England captains, but since they had many other claims to fame Top would seem reasonable.
 * Players with many tests - Generally classed as mid to high importance. That would surely make Hobbs at least High, but having scored more f-c runs and centuries than anyone else I think would justify Top.

I also think that Bodyline should be Top and Cardus at least High. I believe that anyone rating an article's importance should give their reasons in the Talk page. JH (talk page) 21:08, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * BlackJack has now moved Bart King down to low importance. To suggest that King is of low importance is simply ludicrous. Reasons please BJ? Andrew nixon 21:37, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I've decided to be bold and reinstate King to high importance, giving my reasons on the talk page of the article. I'd suggest that this should be done as a matter of policy. Andrew nixon 21:55, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

These are the definitions applicable to ratings which should be done objectively:

Clearly, cricket itself and some of the more important ancillary subjects like the laws are top priority because they are of the utmost importance and form the basis of all information. No player, not even Grace or Bradman, is as important as the sport itself so can we please get a sense of perspective here.

High class refers to general areas of knowledge, not specific, and so something like England cricket team comes in here while great players and important venues, being specific, go into the mid-class.

As for who was a great player, or what is an important venue, that is subjective. King was not a Test player and was of no real significance, although I don't deny that he was a fine bowler. You can hardly equate him with Grace, Rhodes, Bradman, Hobbs, Sobers, etc.

The importance standards re national captains and what have you are completely inconsistent with the status meanings above. A team is generic: for example, the England team encompasses over 600 individuals. A player is specific: WG Grace does not cover a general area of knowledge but the England team does. --BlackJack | talk page 22:01, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * King of no real significance? Perhaps you might wish to read the article. And people did, and do, equate him with those players you mentioned. I'd like to get some other opinions on this though. I will say that I have had the decency to give my reasons for change in importance (and reverted it back to what had not been contested when it came up for discussion here a while back) on the talk page of the article, how many of the 100+ importance changes you've done today have you done that for? Andrew nixon 22:31, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * My two øre: This is absolutely nothing to get worked up about. It's an internal categorisation that is merely useful to remind us about what should be done or not. Since King already has an excellent article (might need some copyediting from people who aren't familiar with cricket, perhaps, I might get someone around to reading it), categorising him as high, low, whatever, really doesn't matter since someone has already taken that article under its wing.


 * Also, discussing importance changes individually when you're trying to systematise them is simply not practical (can we please stop the sniping about "decency", it's really not helping anything): at most these changes should be discussed here, in this forum or alternatively on the assessment forum, to have hard, solid, fixed criteria that apply to all articles and can be used by everyone. Clearly this isn't the case at present, so we need to hammer out some things: but can we do that in peace and without shouting at each other? Thanks. Sam Vimes | Address me 22:52, 6 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Fair enough Sam, I apologise for any offence caused, it certainly wasn't my attention. I just was a little annoyed that BlackJack was changing several importance ratings without any discussion, which seemed a little strange to me. I realise now that it isn't anything to get worked up about, and I wouldn't really bother if any were changed. I do agree that we do need some fixed (relatively) criteria on importance however, those above are a little vague, and don't seem to be specific to the Cricket Project, unlike those at some other projects. Andrew nixon 22:58, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

It's very difficult to rate the importance of cricketers on specific criteria. Victor Trumper was a great cricketer, everyone would accept that, yet his test record pales in comparison with some relatively minor players of today, S.F. Barnes is another one. It's always going to be a subjective thing even in a sport so awash with statistics. You just need to have a consensus, maybe a voting procedure on this page which evens out people's opinions of some of the arguable cases like Bart King. Is there a log anywhere of how many hits a page gets? I bet the ones on the indian and pakistani stars of today get huge numbers so for that reason alone the articles need to be good and so they're important. That doesn't mean that Sewag is a better batsman than Sutcliffe though. The good thing is that you're all so passionate about this and eager to make the project better. Can I suggest that if anyone wants to have a go at someone they have a go at me for any reason they like? I know I deserve it so I wouldn't be offended. Nick mallory 01:31, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I do not have to discuss ratings given. I have registered myself as an assessor and I have made use of the facility in the same way that half a dozen others have done before me.  As far as I have seen, none of the others has ever prompted a discussion of the ratings given and the majority of talk pages with these ratings contain no discussion at all.  If anyone else intends to change ratings they must also register as an assessor and then follow the approved rating method.
 * The table of status values and meanings that I reproduced above is used throughout Wikipedia by numerous projects and it is clear that it has been objectively considered and determined by reference to the needs of the project itself, especially given the subject-matter concerned.
 * This project is about cricket – a subject with an enormous history, an enormous repertoire, and enormous geography and an enormous cast. There are some people who think individual players are more important than the sport itself or that an individual team is all that matters.  This is where you get subjective nonsense introduced to what should be an objective study: indeed Wikipedia demands that objectivity applies to all articles.
 * While the status table above is generic, the other guidelines mentioned by JH, who seems to have had second thoughts, is a misguided attempt to interpret the status meanings in cricket project terms. These guidelines are wrong and I shall be revising them.
 * Cricket itself is the essential top importance article in a project about cricket. A few other articles like Laws of cricket and History of cricket are equally important to provide understanding of the whole subject and these articles are actually extensions of the main article itself: they have been created separately for reasons such as space and presentation.  At the present time, the whole subject of cricket is focused upon 2007 Cricket World Cup and so I have taken the view that this article is currently of top importance because it is impossible to think of cricket at the moment without taking into account this very special event.  Once the competition ends, the article is just another history piece.
 * High class items are generic subjects that are important to an understanding of cricket as a subject and cover a "general area of knowledge". So, as I wrote above, England cricket team with its long history and its huge cast of performers covers a massive general area of knowledge especially in terms of its interfaces with hundreds of other articles about administration, teams, venues, competitions, etc.
 * Mid-class items are for specifics and it is here that significant personnel can be introduced according to the status criteria because an individual in cricket is a specific topic. As for who is significant, I'll use a couple of examples. I'll bet most of you have never even heard of William Clarke while I suppose everyone has heard of Ian Botham.  Clarke is extremely significant and Botham is not.  Clarke shaped the development of the sport; Botham was just another good player (incidentally, Clarke was also a good player and a better bowler than Botham, but that's POV).
 * The point here is that although Botham unquestionably made his mark, mainly in publicity terms, he did not actually do anything that has moved the subject forward or has had any significant impact on the subject's development. Note that word "subject".  The subject is cricket.  William Clarke had a profound impact on the subject.
 * To turn this around, suppose one of Botham's fans decided to create WikiProject Botham and then set about classifying articles in relation to that project? In that case, the top importance article would be Ian Botham while cricket would be rated only as a high.  Somerset CCC would be rated high alongside England cricket team, but Yorkshire CCC (sorry, Nick) would be a low.  Viv Richards would be a mid.  Sky Sports would be a high.  Articles about Grace, Bradman, Hambledon, roundarm and so on would not even merit a low because they would be irrelevant to the subject of that project.
 * Finally, I think certain people need to get a sense of perspective about the subject. The project is about cricket as a sport and as a historical, social and cultural phenomenon.  Of course there have been individuals who have shaped its course or have performed well on the field, but they are only individuals.  Probably the most important individual ever was the Duke of Richmond without whom, etc.  I singled Ian Botham out above because he more than anyone else attracts the sort of hero worship that elevates a personality above his team and even his sport: entirely due to media excess.  Although Ian Botham to his credit distances himself from such drivel and is quite objective about his own achievements, freely acknowledging that he was never in the same class as contemporaries like Hadlee, Richards and Marshall.
 * If he can be objective, then so can we. --BlackJack | talk page 07:55, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

That's an excellent argument Blackjack. I was just looking at it from the users point of view, and if Wikipedia is to remain successful it must focus on the people who use it and offer them what they need. Wikipedia should be the best means to the end of people getting the information they want for free, not an academic end in itself. What are the fifty most viewed pages on cricket on wikipedia for example? Whatever they are it's important that they're excellent otherwise people will go elsewhere. It's the mass of internet users who decide what is important to them, not us. Yes it's great to have the sort of structure of historical importance you advocate but it's not the only consideration. Eukaryotic cells are the basis of nearly all life on earth, but that doesn't mean the pages for lion, tiger and elephant matter less on wikipedia if you're trying to make a popular encyclopedia. Ian Botham didn't change cricket but it's very important that his page here is accurate, interesting and full of good information. As it's written voluntarily too writers will shape it the way they want. People write about what interests them and what interests people the most will have the best pages. Charles Lennox is in good hands if you're looking after him anyway. Nick mallory 08:41, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Thank you, Nick. As long as I've been on here, I've said repeatedly that as an editor I'm here to provide information to the readers.  Information is what counts, not all the WP:REDTAPE stuff.  --BlackJack | talk page 09:52, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, what worries me is that anyone trying to find out about cricket might well decide to look only at the Top and High importance articles. If that doesn't include the biographies of the most significant figures in the game's history, then they will get a misleading impression. How can Grace and Harris be of only Mid importance? Without Grace, we probably wouldn't have cricket anything like it is today. He, together with the railways, turned it a mass spectator sport. And Harris practically ran cricket for some thirty years. It also wiill not help in situations like the recent O'Reilly incident. If he had been ranked as of only Mid importance it would have been hard to assert that he was of comparable notability to the American political commentator. Project Cricket is surely meant to be a collaboration. For one person, though with the best of motives, to introduce a major, wide-ranging change like this without any prior consultation seems wrong to me. It's not unlike the action of certain administrators, who caused some grief by the deletion of cricket stubs without sufficient consultation. The other cricket article assessors seem to be working to different criteria to BlackJack, since they either created or let stand the ratings that he has now downgraded. Perhaps the assessors should consult amongst themselves, and try to arrive at a consensus on article ratings? That would surely be preferable to relying on one person's opinion, however knowledgeable they are. JH (talk page) 09:29, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * If they do look at top and high importance what have they lost by looking at cricket and then going down a level to England cricket team and then down another level to WG Grace? This is pretty much how the categories work in practice.  It's a structure based on a root topic or key article and it decomposes downwards.  On the other hand, if they look for a top article and find it is about some American player whose name is unknown to the vast majority of cricket fans what use is that to them in their study of cricket as subject?
 * Your comments about Grace and Harris are entirely subjective. They both achieved and contributed more to the subject than, say, Botham has done, although Botham was a vastly superior player to Harris.  But Botham's value to the subject is low, while that of Harris is mid because he was a significant specific contributor, as was Grace.  And, since you talk about the railways, as was Clarke who was the first person to realise the potential of the railways in cricket terms.
 * The whole point about the status values and meanings table is that it applies across the site and in other projects it is used correctly in objective terms. For example, in the Australia project, Ponting is a low.  In the India project, all the Indian cricketers assessed are low.  You have got to think in subject-matter terms not in personality terms.
 * If you want Ponting to be high then create WikiProject Ponting because then he will be top, not just high. But in terms of Australia and cricket he is only a good batsman.  He has not done anything significant to develop or progress either subject and so his importance is low.  Incidentally, being of low importance is not an insult: those of no importance or relevance at all don't even get assessed.


 * I've expanded the guidelines on the cricket assessment page to make them fit the Wikipedia status criteria and an example I've used there is that Grace was arguably the greatest ever player but he was only a player who was not as important as either the England or Gloucestershire teams he played for and they are not as important as the sport itself: hence cricket is "top", England is "high", Grace is "mid" (his brothers would be "low").
 * Objectivity and perspective. Players are NOT as important as the teams or the sport when the subject-matter of the project is the sport overall.  That is why Wikipedia has created its model to encourage objectivity.  --BlackJack | talk page 09:52, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Your comments about Grace and Harris are entirely subjective. An element of subjectivity is inescapable when rating them, but pretty much every cricket historian agrees with me on their importance. I would have no trouble in providing citations for that.
 * For example, in the Australia project, Ponting is a low. In the India project, all the Indian cricketers assessed are low. Of course, because a sport, and even more so players of that sport, are of Low importance in the context of a whole country. For Project Cricket, however they are clearly of higher importance. I'd have no quarrel with WPBiography if they rated Grace as Low, as he is in the context of all the famous people who ever lived. But I would quarrel with them if they rated, say, Abraham Lincoln, as Mid rather than something higher, on the grounds that the History of America should be Top and the Civil War High, which would seem to follow from your ideas on structure. Yes, there's a logic behind your idea, but I think that it leads to seriously misleading results. Anyway, I'll let it rest now, as we are clearly never going to agree.  JH (talk page) 10:35, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps we could have separate guidelines on importance for separate topics? ie, a guideline for players that sees those players widely regarded as important at top (Grace, Bradman, Sobers, etc), for grounds that would see current regular Test grounds at the top, for teams that would see the Test teams at the top, ODI status/first-class teams at high, the rest of the associates/minor domestic sides at mid, and affiliates at low? Just a thought. Andrew nixon 11:08, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * The problem you both have is not with me because I have applied the existing status criteria as Wikipedia has set it out. If you don't like the criteria, I'm sure there must be a forum somewhere in which you can raise your issues.
 * But for once a Wikipedia process has been done very well because these status criteria are entirely logical and demand an objective, top-down, structured approach to article importance classification.
 * Read the status meanings carefully and then read what I have written on the assessment page, including the examples given. The method cannot be faulted as long as people do not try to misinterpret the status criteria by subjectively assuming, for example, that a player or team has equal importance with the sport itself. It works almost like categorisation and it is precisely what a new reader needs.  Remember the new reader cannot form subjective opinions: he wants to read and learn about cricket and he needs a top-down structure so that he can follow it through in a logical, informative way without being sidetracked by someone's view that an obscure American player is more significant than Yorkshire or the googly or several hundred Test players.
 * As with many other things on Wikipedia, this ratings facility is there so that editors can help the readers, not so that they can indulge their own favourite topics. --BlackJack | talk page 16:04, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, but I do still think that as cricket is such a wide field, importance ratings for different aspects of the game should be considered. I don't think anyone would argue that WG Grace would be anything other than top-importance if we were talking about cricket players only, but probably not in the game as a whole. Whilst you are on this sticking to the criteria mode (I do have a slight chuckle to myself over the ever-so-slight irony of that) I'll point out that you have categorised Argentina national cricket team as low importance, when the criteria you refer to on the Assessment page says that associate members should be mid-importance. I'm sure you'll correct that error. I wouldn't want to do it myself for fear of incurring the almighty wrath of the assessment team. (Note: Some of the preceding text is intended in jest, apologies for those who don't appreciate my sense of humour!) It does also amuse me somewhat to see King considered more important to the Philadelphia project than the cricket project, but that's life I guess. Andrew nixon 16:42, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * One possibility is creating a sub-project of WP:CRIC called WikiProject Cricket Players, so an emphasis on importance on certain players can be mentioned there. I do think however that restricting the Top rating for the main cricket article is not using the classification to our full potential. One key reason for classifying the articles is to set higher standards for and improve the more important articles in the short term. For example, it is obviously more important to GA/FA a WG Grace than a Zimbabwean who has only played one first class match. GizzaChat  &#169; 05:55, 8 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, as things stand we only have Mid and Low to cover the whole range of players (and other cricket people). So WG would be Mid and the Zimbabwean would be Low, which hardly points up the difference in their significance. Then an intermediate player, such as say Mark Butcher, has to be equated with one or other of these. Only two ratings does not give sufficient spread. The ratings need to be not only logical but useful. JH (talk page) 08:38, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I've actually been conducting an experiment here and didn't expect the discussion to be pre-empted before I'd finished. The present system of measures is completely unsatisfactory because it has clearly been designed by someone with a computing or scientific background. It is unsuitable for a sports project where a rating will invariably be partly subjective. Sport after all has an element of romance about it: it is not a system.

What I'd like to do is try and use these quality and importance measures as a basis for prioritisation of the stubs, especially the biography stubs. But I'm convinced now that they cannot be used unless we revise the importance scale. The quality scale is not too bad except I would decompose stub-class into advanced stub, adequate stub and inadequate stub (the latter being anything likely to be tagged as an alert or an AfD).

For the importance scale, I'd like to see this ranged across the different categories and the number of options increased. My first thoughts are that we should have a key or root class at the top which is of course cricket and then a scale of major, high, middle, low and minor; plus "not yet assessed". We could then have criteria within each category so that, for example, WG Grace, Indian cricket team, cricket bat and Lord's Cricket Ground could all be rated as major. Obviously the people category would need a higher degree of subjectivity than the others.

I think we should forget the importance ratings that have already been applied as they are practically useless re both their former and current values. I'll be revising them again once we have a consensus on how to make the measures suitable for the cricket project. So, apologies if you thought I was being pedantic but I did want to conclude this experiment so that I can study the final outcome and your comments have been very useful. The conclusion is that it doesn't work: it's broke so lets try and fix it. Watch this space. --BlackJack | talk page 14:47, 8 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I'll comment on this later, but it would have been nice to let us know that you were doing an experiment when this blew up the other day. Andrew nixon 15:40, 8 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks. That sounds like a promising approach. JH (talk page) 15:52, 8 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry, Andrew, but things were well warmed up by the time I noticed the thread and I decided to "play a part" so to speak and keep the pot boiling because I was reading some very salient points of view and I wanted more. Apologies for being a devious bastard but it has been very useful.  ;-)  --BlackJack | talk page 18:12, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

WP:CCOTM
Are we going to let this one die too?--ThugChildz 08:02, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

What exactly needs doing to the 'cricket' article? I wouldn't presume to mess about with such an important page without knowing exactly what needs to be done, though i'm obviously happy to mess about with lots of others. Is it just an edit to improve the English that's needed or adding new sections or adding links or what? Nick mallory 08:52, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Mainly adding more references in the correct format.--ThugChildz 00:19, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Rafa1892
According to user Rafa1892 Pat Pocock once had sex with a donkey. Does the Surrey County Cricket Club section have a section specialising in interspecies erotica? And if not, why not? Nick mallory 06:44, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I also have a new favourite cricketer, Ilikena Lasarusa Talebulamainavaleniveivakabulaimainakulalakebalau (also known as Ilikena Lasarusa Talebulamainavaleniveivakabulaimainakulalakebalau of course) and somewhat disappointingly down only as IL Bula here on Wikipedia. Nick mallory 08:30, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Everard Jackson
He's on the players to be done list, does anyone know who he is? I found a reference to a New Zealand rugby player but cricinfo and cricket archive didn't seem to have him. Is he known by another name? Maybe I'm spelling it wrong or something. It strikes me that there's a lot of well known county players who don't have an entry yet, maybe their names should go up there first as that would encourage people to actually do them. Nick mallory 01:54, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I would say ignore him. He's added by the same guy as is mentioned here. He probably has some connection to cricket, but I reckon it's the rugby project who should do him.


 * goes to clean up list of things added by that IP* Sam Vimes | Address me 07:58, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Good. Nooshan Al Khadeer was taking the piss as well I think. Nick mallory 08:55, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Nah. Nooshin Al Khader or Al Khadeer has five Tests and 71 ODIs for India women. Probably enough to be notable, even though no one has a clue where she was born. Sam Vimes | Address me 09:05, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Cleaned up. I'd like to point out that the substubs are probably more important than the redlinks, though, since people will expect some information from a bluelink and are disappointed when it essentially says "this bloke played cricket". Sam Vimes | Address me 09:26, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough about Nooshan Al Khadeer. I didn't mean to be disrespectful to her but I looked for Steve O'Shaughnessy, a recentish Lancashire player who scored one of the fastest ever first class hundreds and all I found was some footballer. I know it was declaration bowling but still. There would be people willing and able to do a decent article for him if his name was at the top of the page. Staying with Lancashire, which is one of the better covered counties as at least it has a decent list, John Abrahams hasn't got a page, neither has Brian Booth or Ian Cockbain. I know this is an international project but these players should be up there with the lovely Nooshan in terms of importance I think. I'll follow Sam's suggestion and try to expand a few of the stubs. Nick mallory 09:50, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * If you can find "embarrassing" redlinks but don't have the time to write them, feel free to put them up on that list. :) I just spent half an hour trying to figure some notables out... Sam Vimes | Address me 09:59, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I will Sam. You're right about the stub list, important players like Wayne Daniel have virtually nothing. I've done Junior Murray, Martin Kent, Jim Love and a few others and i'll keep working through it now. It's a pity there aren't a few more keen writers from the subcontinent here as a lot of the players are from there. Nick mallory 10:32, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Thinking about players who people of a certain age grew up watching in the seventies and need a page, how about Keith Pont of Essex? Stuart Turner goes to an engineer instead of the Essex all rounder too. Colin Dredge the demon of Frome? Jeff Tolchard? Brian Hardie? Ray East has a tiny stub and David Acfield has nothing. Norman McVicker is another blank. John Dye of Northants? Mike Buss of Gloucestershire? Chris Waller of Sussex? Keith Tomlins and Keith Jones of Middlesex? Phil Russell of Derbyshire, Dudley Owen-Thomas and Stewart Storey of Surrey? Graham Burgess, Brian Langford, Derek Taylor, Hallam Moseley, Allan Jones and Dennis Breakwell of Somerset? There's also Graham Johnson and Norman Graham of Kent. There are pages for some of these names, but none of them are the cricketers as far as I can see. There's also Mike Llewellyn, Tony Cordle, John Hopkins and Arthur Francis of Glamorgan. David Turner and John Rice of Hampshire, Neal Abberley and Bill Blenkiron of Warwickshire and John Inchmore of Worcestershire. Would it be ok if I put some of these players on the to do list up top then, as a newbie I don't like to presume. Maybe some of them already exist but a search under their usual name doesn't find them. Nick mallory 11:33, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Stewart Storey is on my "to do" list, as part of my effort to see that all Surrey players who amassed more than 10,000 runs, 500 wickets or 200 wicketkeeping dismissals should have an entry. See Talk:Surrey County Cricket Club. BTW it should be Colin Dredge and David Acfield. JH (talk page) 13:02, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Quite right to pick up my typos JH, I've corrected them to save any confusion. My point is only that these guys matter more than some of the people who appear in the 'players to do' list. I'm not saying saying we should do them all right now! Especially as there's also Nigel Cowley, Bobby Parks and Rajesh Maru of Hampshire, Derek Aslett and Chris Penn (not the fat actor) of Kent, Robin Boyd-Moss, Jim Griffiths and Richard Williams of Northants, John Birch and Kevin Saxelby of Notts, Duncan Pauline, David Thomas, Graham Monkhouse and Andy Needham of Surrey, Ricardo Ellcock, Paul Pridgeon of Worcestershire too. Ian Butcher and Gordon Parsons of Leicestershire, Asif Din and Anthon Ferreira of Warwickshire and Paul Newman of Derbyshire are also not covered. I'm a bit scared that I know all these guys. Just how much time have I wasted playing and watching this game? Nick mallory 13:21, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Having checked them out, quite a few actually had articles:


 * Allan Jones = Allan Arthur Jones
 * Phil Russell = Philip Russell (cricketer)
 * David Turner = David Turner (cricketer)
 * Fred Swarbrook = Frederick Swarbrook
 * Damien D'Oliveira = Damian D'Oliveira
 * Paul Newman = Paul Newman (cricketer)


 * And there was also a Richard Williams (cricketer) who played for Gloucestershire, guessing it's not the one you had listed though. Sam Vimes | Address me 13:46, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Judging by this impressive list of names (who all have a couple of hundred FC games I reckon, without having checked), I'd say anything you put up is much more likely to be worthy of an article than whatever the New Zealand IP writes, really. Sam Vimes | Address me 13:47, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for checking them out Sam. I just did a wikipedia search for them all under their usual names, like a casual surfer would. Perhaps I shouldn't have done if off the top of my head based on bits of old games I remember. At least I know how to spell Damian now! I'm not here to make work for anyone so I'll gradually work through them myself as well. Nick mallory 13:58, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I find that looking through the appropriate county category applicable to the player in question is helpful in seeing if a player's article exists under any of the possible permutations of his name. Unfortunately, occasionally someone creates an article for a player without including the appropriate category for his county. Where a cricketer is well known by more than one name, it's useful when creating their article to also include redirects from common alternative names. JH (talk page) 19:30, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

The Ashes Disambiguation
I want to encourage everyone who is writing for the Cricket Project, please avoid the wikilik  Ashes , as it dose not go to The Ashes cricket series, but to a disambiguation page with the many other uses of the term instead. Please use the link  The Ashes  or  Ashes  when referring to the series. Thanks! --Knulclunk 02:59, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Category:Cricket venues in Grenada
For some strange reason this category uses "venues" in its title while all the other 19 categories in Category:Cricket grounds use "grounds".

Can one of you with admin facilities please do a speedy rename? Thanks. --BlackJack | talk page 13:43, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Actually, I think the one ground in the category should be moved to Category:Cricket grounds in the West Indies and the category deleted. We don't have subcategories for all the different countries/territories that make up the West Indies, so why should we for Grenada? Andrew nixon 13:49, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I think we need to have a cricket specific policy that for geographical entities we separate on nations and not nation-states =Nichalp   «Talk»=  17:53, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

West Indies template
The template has been messed up for some while now and I don't know how to fix it. Could someone take a look at it please? Cheers Crickettragic April 11
 * Taken a look. It's odd. Image was originally pointing to the wrong place (although you only changed that recently), change it back and the image is no longer a red link but it won't actually show the image. What I also noticed was: the same problem occurs on the 2003 page *and* the Irish cricket team: which has a different flag to that of it's nation. This suggests it's actually an error in the Template:National_squad. I'm looking there now. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by AllynJ (talk • contribs) 01:32, 11 April 2007 (UTC).
 * Seems someone picked up on this just yesterday: see Template_talk:National_squad for more details, have alerted to the problem and pointed at the examples that are currently an issue. AllynJ 01:42, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Images in .bmp format
Friends, I have a technical question. I've got an image of John Thayer (cricketer) in .bmp format. I manipulated it in MSPaint, and now cannot get it into a .jpg format or anything else that I can upload to the commons. Can anyone help? You can e-mail me if you'd like.-- Eva  b  d  14:00, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Do you have any other image manipulation software such as Irfanview, Paint.NET or GIMP? I wouln't advise you to save as JPG if the image is that old. =Nichalp   «Talk»=  14:35, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
 * No, I don't. Can I e-mail the image to someone else and have them work their magic?-- Eva  b  d  14:45, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
 * My gmail address is nichalp.wiki. =Nichalp   «Talk»=  14:47, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks! The images have now been uploaded and added to the commons page. One has also been added to the article.Your help was much appreciated, Nichalp.-- Eva  b  d  18:21, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Bart King
On a separate but related note, I've had a copy-edit tag on Bart King since February. I've tried finding someone from the League of Copyeditors to take a look at it, but that fizzled out. I'm mostly hoping that an experienced editor can give John Barton King a solid and thorough copy edit before putting it up as an FAC. Any help on that front is also greatly appreciated.-- Eva  b  d  14:22, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Catch hold of ALoan for copyediting. If you put up a PR, I can critique it for style and comprehensiveness. =Nichalp   «Talk»=  15:32, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * It's had a Peer Review once before. I was going to relist it in a push for FAC after the general copy-edit. I'll see if ALoan has time.-- Eva  b  d  17:00, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I'll have look at it, let me know if there's anything else I could do.--THUG CHILD z  18:54, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

John Barton King is now up for another Peer Review here. ALoan did a thorough copy edit and I'm hoping to be up to snuff for an FAC very soon. Any help appreciated.-- Eva  b  d  18:45, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Anthony Pullinger
According to his page he played Test cricket for England between 1948 and 1955. No source is provided and a search of Cricinfo failed to find such a player. Could you guys take a look at it .. I think it is a fair candidate for deletion - --Crickettragic 15 April 2007


 * Looks like this is a repetition of what happened with Jan du Plessis, who was created as a Test cricketer but was actually a businessman - see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cricket/Archive 30. Anthony Pullinger is actually Deputy Director General of the Panel on Takeovers and Mergers. There might be enough information out there to write a decent stub about the chap, but otherwise this should be nommed for deletion as a hoax. →Ollie (talk • contribs) 14:47, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

I have added a Prod. He is not a first-class cricketer, and I suspect the businessman is a coincidental namesake. The original creator was User:Pully92 and this is the user's only contribution (on Christmas Day!). Johnlp 18:39, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

To be fair it just says that he was an english 'cricket player' which could mean a club cricketer. There's no information in the info box regarding supposed Test Match statistics, only the tiny first and last match dates which could have been a mistake. The guy isn't a first class cricketer, so he shouldn't be in, but I don't think it's a malicious hoax. Maybe someone writing about their dad as a 'present'? Maybe this is a different Anthony Pullinger to the Deputy Director General mentioned above? It should be deleted anyway, stuff like this just gives ammunition to the cricket doesn't matter brigade. Nick mallory 19:34, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * My bad, User:Crickettragic mentioned the he played Test cricket and I didn't look hard enough at the article to see otherwise. I jumped to the conclusion that it was the same prankster with some sort of business/cricket fascination. →Ollie (talk • contribs) 19:43, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Agree it's very unlikely to be malicious and I've no reason to doubt the chap exists/existed. Coincidentally there was a George Pullinger who did play first-class cricket for Essex in 1949 and 1950, so he would be presumably a contemporary. I'm not sure anyone is ploughing through Essex players in the same way that Nick is doing Yorkshire and User:Nigej is doing Somerset (and User:Loganberry has been doing Worcestershire over a long period). So the Pullingers will be unrepresented for a while. Johnlp 19:55, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Just to clarify, the reason I said that he was a supposed Test cricketer is because at the bottom of the infobox it lists the years of his first and last Tests. Crickettragic April 15

Quality & Importance - High-Level Survey of Categories
Further to the above discussion, I've made a preliminary study of the existing main categories to see what the top-rank articles are in each (if any) and where we can expect to find other articles of top or high importance.

This should give us some pointers in assessing quality and importance when we want to prioritise articles and especially stubs for development. I'll continue the survey and report further findings shortly but if anyone has any points that will be useful, please reply below..... --BlackJack | talk page 18:59, 8 April 2007 (UTC)


 * That looks reasonable. One thought, going back to your previous posting. The importance scale suggested is major, high, middle, low and minor; plus "not yet assessed". That "major" is above "high" rather than below it isn't immediately obvious from the names, and ditto for "low" and "minor". So I suggest highest, high, middle, low and lowest; plus "not yet assessed". (Or even "top" - or maybe "key" - and "bottom" at the extremes.) JH (talk page) 19:42, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I would say that the Key Cricket administration would be the International Cricket Council and for Cricket equipment it would be Cricket equipment.--ThugChildz 20:13, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Also there should be a tournament/tour/series category with sub-cats by international or domestic don't you think?--ThugChildz 20:15, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Good work BlackJack! Might I second the suggestion that rating names are kept very clear. I'd never know if key was higher or lower than high for example, it's one of those trendy names which can mean anything. I also think we should always keep the readers in mind when organising this. What structure makes it easy for someone, who may know nothing about the subject, find out what they want? Nick mallory 07:02, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Some brilliant feedback there. Thanks very much.
 * I've made a few changes to the table to reflect your comments. Cricket equipment has been moved to Cricket clothing and equipment but even so I shouldn't have missed it.  ICC is certainly top-rank and also MCC, but for historical as much as administrative reasons.
 * I agree that major and minor are ambiguous alongside high and low. As we already have top, high, mid and low, I propose that we add bottom for topics that are of passing interest only (trivia, if you like); in the case of players, those who have made only a handful of first-class appearances; re teams, it would be local club sides.  I think having a key class as I suggested before would be superfluous: providing cricket and its supplements are rated top-rank, I agree that will suffice.  I suggest we use imporatnce classes top, high, mid, low and bottom; plus not yet assessed.
 * For quality, I've been reading the conditions for start-class and this effectively caters for my previous suggestion that we should have an advanced stub class. Instead of advance stub, I think we should remove the stub tag and classify it as "start".  Stub and stub-class should apply to an acceptable or adequate stub that gives a meaningful overview and is properly wikified, referenced, categorised, etc. But I definitely think we should introduce an "alert-class" for stubs and indeed lengthy articles that are potential redirect, tag or AfD fodder. Although I have taken on board the point about my season and tour stubs, I am mainly concerned about the biography stubs here as they often lack references, categories, structure, correct titles, you name it.
 * I recommend that we just boldly go for this and see how it works, but I'll wait a few days before changing the template to give you all chance to consider and make additional suggestions.


 * Finally, I think ThugChildz is right that we need international tours to have a higher profile. The category was tucked away under international competitions and I have left it there but also added it to the main category level as shown above.  The point is that a tour is not strictly a competition, although it includes competitions such as Test and LOI series.


 * Thanks again for the feedback to date. Hope you're all having a good Easter (I keep coming on here to escape all the gardening jobs!).  --BlackJack | talk page 11:09, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Looking good. I would suggest that under category:Cricket controversies the following should have high importance: Bodyline and Throwing (cricket). The former because of its impact, which went well beyond cricket, and the latter because it has been an ongoing issue - in one form or another - through most of the time since the first code of laws was drawn up. JH (talk page) 17:49, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Ball tampering and betting controversies in cricket should also be high, I think. --BlackJack | talk page 05:56, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Please note that I've created Category:Cricket articles by quality and importance which categorises articles by both ratings. This method is used by Project India so I pinched it from there. For example, articles in Category:Stub-Class cricket articles of Top-importance should have development priority. --BlackJack | talk page 05:56, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * What would actually go in the article marked 'cricketer'? Maybe there should be a lot of links in there to the skills of the game, to great cricketers, the history of the game, test sides, cricketers in literature, whatever to help surfers find their way around rather than a big new article in itself.Nick mallory 10:10, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Good question. One for us all to think about.  As this is a fundamental supplement to cricket it must be a top-rated article but at present it does seem to be a summary only and I'm not really sure if it has more scope than that.  --BlackJack | talk page 05:54, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

I've also created Category:Cricket articles needing attention which is activated by "attention=yes" parameter in the ratings template. --BlackJack | talk page 05:54, 11 April 2007 (UTC)


 * As indicated in the table above (amended), I propose that we should allow registered assessors to veto subjective nominations about players and teams to prevent hero-worship ratings. I propose that only Grace and Bradman are top-rank importance among people and that only MCC is top-rank among teams or clubs. Any other person or team/club/country can be nominated for "high importance" but not if vetoed by a registered assessor.  So, if someone not a million miles from here votes for Roy Booth as a "high", I as an assessor can veto him down to "mid" where he belongs, alongside Jimmy Binks!  ;-)


 * I think it is easy enough to be objective about non-person and non-team articles but I'm concerned about subjectivity among the hero-worship element who think that someone like Pietersen is the greatest player of all time! --BlackJack | talk page 22:32, 12 April 2007 (UTC)


 * The hardest area may be the "cricket people" who weren't primarily players, such as administrators and writers. At least with the players the statistics can be used as guidance, but how does one compare Woodcock with Arlott, for instance? Incidentally, I'd prefer "very low" or "bottom" as an importance rating rather than "no importance". Otherwise non-cricket people are likely to use the rating as a pretext for deleting articles that bear it, saying that the person is not notable. For instance I think that Albert Craig (The Surrey Poet) deserves his article, whilst accepting that he is near the bottom of the importance scale. JH (talk page) 09:11, 13 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Oh, crumbs, you're right! Imagine the fun we'd have with that.  I'll go back to the original idea of "bottom importance": I only changed it because I thought a two-letter parameter is better than a six-letter one. --BlackJack | talk page 18:43, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry to jump into this discussion late, but I wasn't following it before. I have considerable qualms about creating a new importance level of "bottom". Regardless of whether it's a good idea in itself, I think it's a very bad idea to use a different scale from every other WikiProject. Stephen Turner (Talk) 18:59, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Surprisingly, there are already a number of projects using "no importance", although I agree with John that this term invites the "not notable" crew such as Nick's little friend. The importance and quality ratings and categories used elsewhere are only a guideline that we can adapt for our own purposes and we are being WP:BOLD.  I definitely think it will be worthwhile to pursue a ratings exercise to its logical conclusion as it will enable us to plan how to deal with the 5000+ stubs.
 * Incidentally, do we hold the site record for stubs? I bet we're not far off.  ;-)  --BlackJack | talk page 18:37, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject support of candidates at RfA
There's been some discussion prompted by User:Kelly Martin about WikiProjects endorsing candidates at RfA. This WikiProject is one of the most active and is quite forward-thinking. I'd like to think that we can do this without falling foul of WP:CANVASS (a problem raised at Kelly's talk page). Can I suggest that if any of us spot a member of the WProject at RfA we report it here and debate if the WProject wishes to endorse or not. By a) keeping the coversation here and b) the initial report NOT coming from the candidate, I think we can avoid Canvassing problems. Thoughts? --Dweller 10:38, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

He sounds like a bit of a self important twit to me to be honest. It's up to individuals to endorse people for admin roles or not, as they see fit, and there'd only be a lot more 'canvassing' if people had to sweet talk their way to an endorsement from some project before they could do that. Not everyone is a joiner, it doesn't mean they can't do good work. This is a place for people to write about stuff which interests them for the good of others, not psuedo academic 'career' building. Nobody's getting paid here. This creeping bureaucracy will strangle Wikipedia in the end, hopefully after I get past H in the Yorkshire list. If someone wants to have admin powers then by all means mention it here but formal endorsements are just silly. After all, on the internet, nobody knows you're really a dog. Nick mallory 11:19, 13 April 2007 (UTC)


 * For your information, I'm not a "he". Hope this helps. Kelly Martin (talk) 11:53, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Duly noted Kelly, sorry. Nick mallory 12:07, 13 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Did you read what she proposed? It doesn't sound like it from what you wrote above. The idea is that if the project sees someone doing great work they could nominate them for adminship.  It has nothing to do with endorsing candidates who are already in RfA.  Certainly it is not meant to be that Users become brown nosers in wikiprojects to try and score a nomination.  The hope is that people start focusing more on productive editing and a lot less on "how am I going to get to be an admin as soon as possible".  David D. (Talk) 12:13, 13 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I read a great deal, without picking that up. I guess I'm tired. I don't like that idea at all. Shame. --Dweller 12:55, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
 * You don't like the idea of projects nominating users for admin? How is that different to the current situation where a bunch of friends that hang out in wiki nominate each other repeatedly? I'm not saying this is true for all nominations but it was the case and is probably still the case. David D. (Talk) 17:11, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes David, I did read what she proposed, and I read the large number of comments from other people on her talk page opposing it. I'm sure she means very well and just wants higher standards all round, but I'm opposed to schemes which detract from wikipedia's origin as a peer created commons. There shouldn't be a requirement for people to be part of a project before they can become an administrator. She wasn't just saying that she personally wanted people to be proposed in this way, for which there is no mechanism, but that this should become wikipedia policy. She maintains that no-one who isn't 'endorsed' by a project should become an administrator. That would put a lot of good people off and so have the opposite effect to the one she wants. This is an entirely voluntary undertaking and the more bureaucratic it gets the less effective it'll become. If some projects want to propose people, and come up with their own methods for doing so that's fine. Making it compulsary for everyone, which is what she wants, is not. She's free to argue her case, and I'm free to oppose it. Nick mallory 09:29, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * You may well oppose it but its a better suggestion than the current clique and vanity mentality that tends to run rampant in wikipedia. David D. (Talk) 19:16, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Hear, hear re cliques. --BlackJack | talk page 06:11, 17 April 2007 (UTC)