Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Fully professional leagues/Archive 16

Azerbaijan Premier League
I've noticed Azerbaijan Premier League became part of EPFL. I think it should be added to the list. Here is proof http://www.epfl-europeanleagues.com/profile_aze_pfl.htm

Moreover, they display league in this list http://www.epfl-europeanleagues.com/member_leagues.htm

I think this is more than enough evidence.--Xoncha (talk) 09:41, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
 * sigh, we go through this once every few months - EPFL is not a reliable source. GiantSnowman 09:57, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Which sources you need?--Xoncha (talk) 10:36, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Reliable, third-party sources. GiantSnowman 10:43, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

I think we may need to put a hatnote on this page about using the EPFL given how often it seems to be used as justification. Perhaps as part of an FAQ? Number  5  7  11:07, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Yep, good idea, we could also explain the "fully" professional requirement that throws a lot of people off as well... GiantSnowman 11:17, 15 November 2014 (UTC)


 * For future reference and clarity could we have a complete list of which members of EPFL where we have evidence that they aren't fully professional leagues? Nfitz (talk) 04:33, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
 * In a recent AFD it was pointed out by User:Boguslavmandzyuk that "This article states that the salaries of players in the league range from $5,000 to $66,000 a month. Another article states that the top 3 clubs in Azerbaijan have a yearly budget of more than $10 million. It also states that the highest paid players get around 600 euro a year. Another article says that professional players in the Azerbaijan league get salaries that are many times higher than those of the average Azerbaijani. These are just the first three articles I came across. I could very easily find a lot more". Nfitz (talk) 15:14, 8 February 2015 (UTC)
 * To clarify those articles, particularly the first one, I think these are talking about foreign players. Certainly the first article noted is referring to the salaries of foreign players coming into the country not the base salary range for all players. The second source is only referring to the top three clubs and the final to only the highest paid players. I am not sure how these support fully pro status. All these seem to say is that foreign players can earn a decent salary, there are a few clubs that have reasonably sizeable budgets (though by no means all) and that foreign to not the top players earn more than a decent wage. These sort of comments could be applied to any league with a couple of reasonably wealthy clubs and since they specifically do not refer to clubs in general I do not believe are sufficient to support FPL status. Given the attendance figures and the ground sizes for some of the club's as per the Azerbaijan Premier League page I do not think it reasonable to extrapolate the contents of the sources currently provided to infer FPL status across all members. Additionally comments on the APP page about the gulf between the first and scone tiers makes me seriously doubt the FPL status of any team promoted to the top division at the end of any season. Fenix down (talk) 18:49, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

Ecuador
Ecuadorian Serie A, professional? Our article here begins by saying "...Primera A, is a professional football league in Ecuador." But it is not listed in the list neither a pro or no pro. FkpCascais (talk) 20:26, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
 * The question those who doubt would ask, sure it's professional - but is it just semi-professional or fully-professional? Nfitz (talk) 03:33, 18 February 2015 (UTC)
 * More than the distinction between fully- and semi-pro (though that is a concern), the issue with the Ecuadorian Serie A as with most other leagues not listed is an absence of sources. None of the sources listed in the article on the league mention professionalism. Sir Sputnik (talk) 04:02, 18 February 2015 (UTC)
 * So a practical question, a player with appearances in the Ecuadorian Serie A will pass notability or not? FkpCascais (talk) 05:10, 18 February 2015 (UTC)
 * If the appearances are his only claim to notability (i.e. no national team appearances, no evidence of significant coverage) then no. To meet point 2 of WP:NFOOTBALL both the appearance in the league and the full professionalism of the league need to be verified. Sir Sputnik (talk) 06:11, 18 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Understood. Thanks. FkpCascais (talk) 14:43, 18 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I'd say the issue of whether the league is fully-pro or semi-pro is more important than the absence of sources. Ultimately we can rectify the absence of sources; if we find sources the league is semi-pro, there's no fixing that! If there's evidence the league is fully professional then bring it forward! Nfitz (talk) 14:23, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

Thought on WP:FOOTY
This might have come up before. The whole pro vs semi-pro has been a headache. It is understandable that we don't want 1000 articles with questionable to no notability. However, I think that the top flight in any country is inherently notable and inclusion of teams in that league would be beneficial to the reader.

The notable cups is useful but this would take it farther and clear up confusion. Obviously, lower tier leagues could still stay within the current parameters.Cptnono (talk) 19:58, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
 * So playing in the Guam Men's Soccer League makes you notable? Nonsense. GiantSnowman 20:08, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Not only has this come up before, it has been resoundingly rejected every time. (I'll provide appropriate links shortly.) The bottom line is there are any number of countries where even top flight football does not generate sufficient coverage for footballers playing there to be notable. Sir Sputnik (talk) 20:11, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
 * The last discussion on this issue I could find is this wall of text. Sir Sputnik (talk) 20:41, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I actually do think that someone playing in the Guam league is notable, GiantSnowman. Ecuador is another example that is a little bit higher profile but has still been questioned. It is, of course, my own thoughts on the direction Wikipedia should go to further the reader's complete understanding of everything remotely important (I'm an inclusionist I think). Something that is important to people in Guam should have merit or else we risk both limiting the scope of the encyclopedia while also causing an unnecessary burden on contributors. Thanks for the link, Sir Sputnik.Cptnono (talk) 08:32, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I think the important thing to remember is that NFOOTY is only a project guideline. I think there would be considerable reaction outside of the project if suddenly any player in a top league whether professional or not was considered notable. I just don't think there would be the appetite for it overall. That said GNG trumps everything so if you can find sufficient sources on say, a Guaman footballer who doesn't pass NFOOTY that are not routine, ie not just transfer chat and match reporting, then that would be fine. If you think you can locate such sources then I would suggest you start there and see how that goes. Fenix down (talk) 09:42, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
 * No, WP:NFOOTY is a Wikipedia-wide notability guideline - I think you're confusing it with WP:FOOTYN which is a WikiProject Football-specific project guideline which hasn't been fit for purpose for years and is not used for player notability any more. GiantSnowman 10:39, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Players in the English Conference are far more likely to be notable than those in the Guam league. Also, let's not forget that we have to consider the availability of sources; the Guam league isn't exactly well covered online, and it would be incredibly easy for hoaxes to crop up - and never be called out. Luke no 94  (tell Luke off here) 11:26, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure that every top flight league should be here. At the same time, we have some very high-quality leagues such as Costa Rica (and to a lesser extend Honduras), where football is the number one sport, and get significant media coverage. As such, most players with a solid record in the (Costa Rica) league have articles, based on WP:GNG rather than WP:NFOOTY. And that's the point really ... generally we assume that a player in fully professional will most likely meet WP:GNG so we use WP:NFOOTY as a very easy criteria to monitor. However, for some bizarre reason we don't have any references that indicate that the Costa Rican league is fully professional, despite being a top-15 FIFA-ranked nation, despite a good chunk of their World Cup squad playing in their top domestic league, and despite year-in and year-out showing excellent performance in Champions League, with similar performance to US teams, and outperforming both Mexico and the USA this year. I digress a bit, but I think that we need to be a bit more inclusive with some top leagues in countries where football is the prime sport. Nfitz (talk) 02:42, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Are editors worried about server space? Upkeep? Verification? I'm more worried about expanding Wikipedia so that someone in Costa Rica can see an article on a player they might be researching. Guam was obviously an outlying flippant rebuttal but Costa Rica is a good example of the heart of the problem (I don't know if we have actually seen a spike of articles created about players from Guam). It is some times hard to determine if a non English speaking nation in eastern Europe or south east Asia has a professional league. We have some necessarily hard rules in place and my thought is that it does more harm than good to both the reader and contributors. I might be in the minority but things seem broken and I don't know how else to fix it but to be a little bit more accommodating.Cptnono (talk) 05:01, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * And I'm not suggesting that we have a bitch-fest about the entire secondary notability standards; things might just be better if we weren't seeing so much about Azerbaijan or Thailand going to AfD.Cptnono (talk) 05:13, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * a number of years ago I did propose an extension to NFOOTBALL to include top-flight but not-fully-professional leagues which could be shown to have sufficient coverage to satisfy GNG - Ireland and Finland were the two I believe. Ireland has now, if anything, gone less professional, while Finland is fully-pro. If you can prove hat Costa Rica merits inclusion I would support any formal proposal in that respect. GiantSnowman 09:11, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * it's a good idea, but how do we set clear and consistent criteria without wading deep into WP:BIAS? For example, though my gut feel is that the Costa Rica is fully professional, or close enough, it does seem to have less media coverage in their nation (as far as I can tell) than the Honduran League, which I think is less professional (though some of their teams seem to be fully professional - but perhaps less) but has massive media coverage. I haven't got a magic answer ... Nfitz (talk) 23:22, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately neither do I, which is why I think my proposal never came to fruition all those years ago. As imperfect as "fully-professional" is, it's by far the best we've got, which is why it has lasted so long. GiantSnowman 10:00, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

I still think some kind of attendance-based criteria may be a possible answer; In England and Scotland at least, the minimum attendance for fully-pro clubs is generally somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000 (and this seems to be roughly similar across Europe, at least based on what we have confirmed as being fully pro leagues), so a threshold of 1,500 might be sensible, although there would also have to be exceptions (for instance when Rangers were in SFL divisions 2 and 3, they bumped the average attendances up to over 5,000 when typically they'd be less than 10% of that).
 * 1) Professional status is dependent upon attendances (as otherwise clubs can't cover their costs)
 * 2) Attendance figures are widely available for many leagues, and would be far easier to obtain than proof that a league is actually fully professional. It would also be easy to ascertain on a season-by-season basis whether a league met the criteria than trying to work out exactly when leagues that are almost fully professional (or change season-by-season depending on the teams promoted/relegated)
 * 3) Attendances are also directly linked to notability – if games in one league are watched by an average of 1,000 and in another by an average of 100, the players in the former will of course be more notable, as more people will watch them/be aware of them etc.

The changes wouldn't necessarily be that huge. Based on our current list, the entire change list for UEFA leagues are detailed below (top divisions are bolded): As can be seen, the gap between some of the leagues is huge - a couple of non-listed leagues have average attendances over 10 times higher than some we do have listed, which is a significant discrepancy.
 * Added (11): Azerbaijan Premier League (1,725), Belgian Second Division (2,088), Danish 1st Division (1,687), Football Conference (1,824), Championnat National (1,895), League of Ireland Premier Division (1,559), Kazakhstan Premier League (3,893), I liga (1,844), Swiss Challenge League (1,874), Superettan (3,251), TFF First League (4,841 - last season)
 * Removed (7+2): Albanian First Division (369), Belarusian First League (522), Moldovan National Division (623), Segunda Liga (668), Russian Professional Football League (1,028), Slovenian PrvaLiga (1,039), Ukrainian First League (1,248). I also suspect the Greek second and third tiers would be removed, but the site doesn't have figures since 2006, at which point the second tier average was 1,123).

I can potentially see there being issues about giving a blanket allowance to players from non fully-pro leagues that still meet the attendance criteria (e.g. I'm not sure it's a good idea to have articles on Football Conference players), so perhaps if editors are uncomfortable adopting this as the sole definer of status, it could be used as a back-up when there is no definite proof either way as to whether a league is fully pro or not (e.g. in the example of Costa Rica). Number  5  7  12:38, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
 * The only thing about match attendances is that it doesn't take into account TV money/coverage, and doesn't account for regional differences in wages. GiantSnowman 13:02, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
 * There is generally a strong correlation between TV coverage and attendances though – matches are televised if there is interest, and interest is generally gauged by attendances. I'm not sure about the wages point, as admission prices also vary between regions. Number   5  7  11:46, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
 * In general, attendances have nothing to do with pro status. Players' full-time contracts do. If England and Scotland have an attendance requirement, it's their own business, not the rest of Europe's. BlameRuiner (talk) 11:39, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
 * And how can a club afford full-time contracts unless they have sufficient attendances to pay for them? As I said, the two are strongly linked. Number   5  7  11:46, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Sponsorship and governmental support. Also the fact that "full-time contract" in developed countries and poor post-Soviet countries involve sums with different number of zeros at the end. BlameRuiner (talk) 12:10, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Sponsorship itself is still linked to attendances, as advertisers won't pay much for something that won't reach many people. Number   5  7  12:15, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
 * 57, a club selling players can perfectly fill that gap and make clubs sustainable or even profitable without bothering for the attendances. FkpCascais (talk) 14:52, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
 * In one-off cases, yes. A whole league's worth of clubs, no. Let's be realistic here please - we are talking about an entire division, not individual clubs. Number   5  7  16:13, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

Stadium notability?
Another question: is there a stadium notability guideline, or the FPL list can be applied to them too?

Thanks, MYS  77  ✉ 04:50, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
 * WP:N. BigDom (talk) 06:10, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

Why other Brazilian state leagues aren't fully professional?
Hi everyone,

I saw that Campeonato Paulista is listed as a fully pro competition, but Campeonato Carioca, Campeonato Mineiro and Campeonato Gaúcho and others are professional too, according to their federations.

1) In Campeonato Carioca, the first paragraph of the regulation, it says: O Campeonato Estadual de Futebol da Série A de profissionais será realizado com a participação de 16 associações a saber [...];

2) Mineiro: in the Art. 21, it says: É vedada a participação de atletas não profissionais com idade superior a 20 (vinte) anos., which means that only professional and youth players (yes, in Brazil a player can have a youth contract until his 20th birthday) can play;

3) Gauchão: The same rules as the Mineiro are applied, only with a limit of three youth players.

Why they aren't in the list? Cheers, MYS  77  ✉ 19:04, 11 March 2015 (UTC)


 * Ten days and no replies... MYS  77  ✉ 00:38, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I saw this but was too lazy (I am being honest) and thought others would get here. I can't speak for Carioca or Gaucho but I agree that Mineiro is professional. I've been following the league as I have a few players of interest in it and so far I believe through the source and the fact that players could pass WP:GNG it should be added. Cheers. --ArsenalFan700 (talk) 06:38, 22 March 2015 (UTC)


 * Any other opinions? If somebody is against it, please speak. I've added Mineiro in the main list. Cheers, MYS  77  ✉ 01:01, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

II liga
In what way does the Polish FA document saying "professional league" from it's official website and an article in Polish biggest sporting newspaper stating the sentence "the licence should be no surprise to anyone as PZPN has professionalised the Ekstraklasa, I liga and II liga" not clear enough for you? Abcmaxx (talk) 21:59, 5 April 2015 (UTC)
 * I've moved this discussion here from my talk page to allow broader participation. For starters, the Polish FA document was improperly cited. The lede of this page makes it clear that for references to excessively long documents like this one, the citation needs to point to the precise section of the document that talks about full professionalism. Beyond that, the problem here is that unqualified the term "professional" is ambiguous in this context and could just as easily refer to a semi-pro league. Full professionalism has a very precise meaning, namely that all footballers in the league in question are payed for their services and are payed sufficiently well to not require another job. Both of these sources (at least as they are currently cited) suggest that this might very well be the case, but without further clarification as to what is meant by "professional" neither of them actually confirms it. Sir Sputnik (talk) 22:22, 5 April 2015 (UTC)
 * You'll be hard pressed to find a source which are specifically tailored to these demands. I'll put it another way - there aren't any clubs in that league which aren't fully pro, the league below is semi-pro (with many large clubs e.g.Motor Lublin fully pro) with no amateur teams. I amended the citation. But all three league are professional and none of the club are semi-pro - small wages in some teams do not imply any players are amateur Abcmaxx (talk) 22:29, 5 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Found a source stating the changes/professionalisation of the third tier . Here's one stating average players salaries (including leagues below) . Gazeta Wyborcza re-print stating that I liga = proffesional football Here's an article discussing proffessional football in it's town, comparison made to Pelikan Łowicz in II liga  This old (2011) article from a betting company says that I liga is definitely fully pro  Here's an article about pro referee contracts in I liga and their salaries  Stomil Olsztyn definitely professional (has been throughout history but here's an article)  Abcmaxx (talk) 22:55, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 22 April 2015
Regarding Portugal reference, I believe article five of the regulation it's the most appropriate. It's in Portuguese but it roughly translates to "It's official the matches played in the Primeira Liga, Segunda Liga, Portuguese Cup, League Cup and Supercup organized by the Portuguese League of Professional Football and Portuguese Football Federation"--Threeohsix (talk) 12:52, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

Threeohsix (talk) 12:52, 22 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. —  13:35, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

There is "Portugal - Primeira and Segunda Liga", and then it has a reference. It's written "needs a specific cite" on the reference. My answer is that the specific cite is the article five because of the reasons above described.--Threeohsix (talk) 20:42, 23 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Protection has now expired. &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:51, 27 April 2015 (UTC)