Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Nationality

Nationality Discussions
Over the course of some time, there have been several discussions at WT:FOOTY about the appropriate designation and indication of players' nationality, the relevance of indicating this at all, the verification of the claims, and how best to explain the principles employed to readers. While for a large proportion of players, there is no uncertainty at all, the variety of ways in which eligibility to represent a nation can be established, and the possibilities around personal and family history, migration with acquired nationality, changes in national boundaries and ethnic allegiances cause it to be a matter of considerable dispute for many individuals. Just three of the recent lengthy discussions:
 * December 2009
 * also December 2009
 * [|November 2010]

Many other discussions, often specific to individual player's articles, have arisen.

I suggest that our discussion at this page, mainly shall address the issue of nationality indication in squad lists for club articles. Level two headings will divide out the main questions, within these, each proposal can have its own level three heading, with level 4 headings for support, opposition, and observation. As ever, points are considered according to the merits of the reasons presented, not simply number of votes.

Pre Consideration (about how to use flags in WP Football)
Currently we have no clear MOS guideline for the specific use of flags in:


 * National Football Team articles and Template:Infobox national football team.
 * International competition articles for National Football Teams.
 * Football Club articles and Template:Infobox football club.
 * International competition articles for Football Clubs.

Until we reach a consensus for some football related MOS:Flag guidelines, we need to adhere to the official WP:MOSFLAG guidelines. The list below is a copy-paste of the 9 most important MOSFLAG guidelines, that we all need to be aware of:


 * 1) Approved use of flags: Flag icons may be relevant in some subject areas, where the subject actually represents that country, government, or nationality - such as military units, government officials, or national sports teams. In lists or tables, flag icons may be relevant, when the nationality of different subjects, is pertinent to the purpose of the list or table itself.
 * 2) Avoid flag icons in infoboxes: Generally, flag icons should not be used in infoboxes. Flag icons should only be inserted in infoboxes in those cases, where they convey information in addition to the text. Examples of acceptable exceptions, would be military battle infoboxes templates and infoboxes that include international competitions, such as FIFA World Cup or the Olympic Games. The guidelines for a number of common infoboxes (e.g. Template:Infobox company, Template:Infobox film, Template:Infobox person) explicitly prohibit the use of flag icons.
 * 3) Historical considerations: Flags change, and sometimes the geographical or political areas to which a flag applies, may also change. The rule is, always to use the historically accurate flag, for the moment of time it refers to whenever being used. I.e. the USSR flag and country name should be used for reporting before 1992, not those of the Russian Federation or the CIS. Some countries are also new, formed from parts of -or entirely subsuming- one or more other countries. Once again, it is important only to use the historical correct flag; meaning that new flags for new nations, are not allowed to be used for any time frame, prior to the moment where the new nation was born.
 * 4) Use of flags for non-sovereign states and nations: In general, if a flag is felt to be necessary, it should be that of the sovereign state (e.g. USA or Canada) not of a subnational entity, even if that entity is sometimes considered a "nation" or "country" in its own right. This is partly for the sake of consistency across Wikipedia, but also because a person's legal citizenship is verifiable, whereas "nationality" within a country can be porous, indeterminate and shifting. An English person's passport describes them as a "British citizen", for example, not "English"; being English is a matter of self-identification, not a verifiable legality in most cases. Many editors, however, feel that the UK's subnations in particular are an exception in sporting contexts, and disputes are likely to arise if this sovereign state maxim, is enforced in articles on subnational British topics.
 * 5) Do not use flags to indicate locations of birth, residence, or death: The use of a flag can only imply citizenship and/or “representative nationality”. Many people born abroad due to traveling parents never become citizens of the countries in which they were born, and do not claim such a nationality. For example, actor Bruce Willis was born on a U.S. military base in Germany, so putting a German flag in his infobox, for any reason, might lead the casual reader to assume he is or was a German citizen. Similarly, many people die on foreign soil due to war, vacation accidents, etc., and many people emigrate, without any effect on their actual citizenship or nationality.
 * 6) Do not use subnational flags without direct relevance: Subnational flags (regions, cities, etc.) should generally be used only when directly relevant to the article. Such flags are rarely recognizable by the general public, detracting from any shorthand utility they might have, and are rarely closely related to the subject of the article. A common example of use of subnational flags, would be that of a list concerned with subdivisions of a specific country.
 * 7) Do not use supernational flags without direct relevance: Supernational flags (those of international organizations) should generally be used only when directly relevant to the article. For instance, the Flag of Europe, is appropriately used on articles related to the European Union, the Council of Europe and other situations where this flag can be used to represent Europe. In sport, supernational flags should only be used to represent a supernational team or a supernational competition, where the team or competition use the supernational flag. The European flag should generally not be used alongside a national flag in articles about residents of EU member states; it would not be informative, and it would be visually distracting.
 * 8) When the flag templates are used for sports statistics and the like: Use the flag and name of the country (be it a state or a nation), that the person (or team of people) officially represented, regardless of citizenship. If a French player is awarded a medal for playing in a German team, the German flag would be used in a table of awards. The Scottish flag would be used with regard to the FIFA World Cup, but that of the UK for the Olympics. Caution should be used in extending this convention to non-sporting contexts, as it may produce confusing results. And a countervailing example would be an article about a sports team, that officially represents a particular country, but is composed of members who are citizens of several countries; a table of players at such an article might list them by their country of actual citizenship or professed nationality.
 * 9) Use of flags for sportspeople:
 * 10) As with other biographical articles, flags are discouraged in sportspeople's individual infoboxes.
 * 11) Flags should never indicate the player's nationality in a non-sporting sense; flags should only indicate the sportsperson's national squad/team or representative nationality.
 * 12) Where flags are used in a table, it should clearly indicate that the flags represent representative nationality, not legal nationality.
 * 13) Flags should generally illustrate the highest level the sportsperson is associated with. For example, if a sportsperson has represented a nation or has declared for a nation, then the national flag as determined by the sport governing body should be used (these can differ from countries' political national flags). If a sportsperson has not competed at the international level, then the eligibility rules of the international sport governing body (such as IRB, FIFA, IAAF, etc.) should be used. If these rules allow a player to represent two or more nations, then a reliable source should be used, to show who the sportsperson has chosen to represent.
 * 14) If a sportsperson most usually represents a specific country (e.g., Germany) but has represented a larger, supernational entity on some occasions (e.g., Europe) it may be more appropriate to use the national flag; this will often need to be determined on an article-by-article basis.
 * 15) Subnational flags (e.g., England rather than UK) are traditionally used in some sports, and should not be changed to the national flag without consensus.

Deletion of flags -for ALL players listed in a club squad template
A radical proposal was recently made, that in order to solve any controversy and confusion among laymen, about what the flags exactly indicate, we should perhaps consider not show any flags at all, for players listed in a club squad template. Is this a good/bad idea?

Oppose

 * Excessive: flags can be used informatively when they are used with more care than they currently are. Knepflerle (talk) 23:04, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Deletion of flags -for all "Non Internationl players" listed in a club squad template
Another radical proposal was also mentioned in our latest discussion, that in order to solve any controversy and confusion among laymen, about what the flags exactly indicate, we should perhaps consider to enforce a new standard, that it no longer should be allowed to show any flags for all Non International players listed in a club squad template. This way the flags would no longer be allowed to indicate a possible futuristic representation of a national team, for all the Non International players, but only allowed to become visible for those players, who already experienced an actual representation for a specific national team -which by the current FIFA regulations mean: That they finally locked and defined their "Football nationality", according to the senior National Team they were eligiable to play for AND finaly decided also to play for during their entire senior career. Is this a good/bad idea?

Support

 * This is the best compromise between avoiding misrepresentation and including important information. It is also the only flag-based proposal which absolutely avoids original research. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 17:38, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I proposed this a year ago, and still firmly believe this is the best and most informative solution for our readers. Knepflerle (talk) 23:04, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Observations
The deletion of flags by non-international players would certainly make clear the fact that the flags do not denote actual nationality. I am leaning towards supporting this option, but I would like to read some more arguments before I commit fully. Erikeltic ( Talk ) 16:30, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Multiplication of flags -for players listed in a club squad template
Permitting more than one flag to be shown, as in some other language wikis. Meaning that we agree to follow a new standard at WikiProject Football, so that we decide always to list all flags for the optional eligiable "Football nationalities" for each of the "Non International" players. According to the official FIFA rules, most players will only have one "Football nationality", which in most cases -except for UK countries, Faroe Islands and other non full suvereign nations-, will be the same as their official Citizenship. Within the FIFA regulation it is however possible, that players with either 2 Citizenships, or who in other ways fulfill the several local subfederations eligiability rules to play for their National Team, in fact accordingly will have the same number of optional "Football nationalities". The specific "Football nationality" will only be locked, once you as a player decide to play 1 game for a specific Senior National Team, or the moment your age exceed 21 years -if you have a previous record of only presenting a certain Youth National Team, and dont file any application to FIFA that you want to change your "Football nationality" into a new one before the age of 21. To say it short, the current FIFA rules mean that we have a minor group of players, who currently are eligiable to play for several national teams, and therefore it has previously been sugested in our debate, that we in those rare occations, should show all the flags for the specific player in question. Is this a good/bad idea?

Oppose

 * This is the worst available option, as it positively invites original research and has the potential to greatly confuse readers. Furthermore, 16.2 of the relevant FIFA document allows national associations to set their own criteria for representation, which vary both between countries and over time. We cannot possibly hope to maintain an accurate list of all available nationalities for every footballer based on the criteria available at the time. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 17:48, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Observations
The requirement to file an application for change of football nationality before the age of 21 was lifted by FIFA in June 2009 per "Change of association (art. 18 of the Regulations Governing the Application of the FIFA Statutes)". -- Club Oranje T 15:50, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Most recent representation, birthplace/citizenship if none
Our current usual practice. In our recent debate, the problem was however highlighted, that some footballers who were born abroad actualy have very little affiliation with their "birthplace" Nation. Currently we unfortunately have no common standard rules for a persons Citizenship. In UK, USA and Canada, you will automaticly recieve a citizenship if you are born inside their national territory. The rules are however different for the remaining part of the world, where your Citizenship is decided according to the Citizenship of your parents. If a player is born in USA, and have a Danish father and Italian mother, he will automaticly recieve 3 citizenships and initially be eligiable to play for all 3 national teams. Moreover approximately 50% of the nations in the world, also allow their native Citizens -who are only born with 1 citizenship, to later apply for an additional second Citizenship of another nation, if they want. This mean, that players with a Brazilian birthplace who are contracted by a Spanish club, and settle down to live for several years in Spain, often will opt to apply for getting an additional Spanish Citizenship, as this is often requested by their club, in order to have "less problems" to comply with the league rules, of only having X foreign players in the start formation for a game. Theoreticly this mean, that all players who initially are born with only 1 Citizenship, later can apply and get a second Citizenship at 50% of the souverign nations in the world, and thereby also gain a second possible "Football nationality" -as long as they previously did not already represent any senior national team to lock their "Football nationality".

To say it short, neither "birthplace" nor "citizenship" should be considered as a bullet proof indicator, of which "Football nationality" the Non International player finaly will opt to chose, if he at some point of time in his senior career suddenly will get called up by one/several of the national teams he according to FIFA rules and subfederation rules are eligiable to represent. The question for this section however now is, if we should pick either "birthplace" or "citizenship" as a second criteria for picking a flag, for all the so far Non International players?

Oppose
To become eligiable for a national team, some subfederations -like Denmark- require that the player has a Danish citizenship before he become eligiable, while other federations -like New Zealand- do not require a New Zealand citizenship but only that the player can proof one of his parents to be a New Zealander. In Denmark its also important to note, that all persons from Faroe Islands national football team only posses a Danish Citizenship, as Faroe Islands is no sovereign state, and considering the Football nationalities, the only reason we today have a "Faroe Islands National Team" is because the Danish Football association approved this special creation inside its regulative borders, and supported them to become an official member nation of FIFA. Without knowing it for sure, I assume the players eligiable for the Faroe Islands National Team, need to either settle down at the Faroe Islands territory for several years or proof that one of their parents or grandparents once made this choice, in order to become eligiable. Footballers from the non souverign territory known as Greenland, could theoreticly also represent the Greenland national football team, but this team has so far never been approved as official, by neither FIFA nor the Danish Football Association (DBU), meaning that according to FIFA's officialy defined rules, this Greenland "Football nationality" simply doesnt exist! That is why, all Greenlanders are only eligiable to play for the Denmark national football team in the official UEFA/FIFA competitions. One notable example is the Greenland footballer Jesper Grønkjær, who we -despite his birthplace being in Greenland- all consider as a 100% Dane, after he played more than 80 caps for Denmark.

The proposed new flag policy, when applied in a pure Danish context, would mean that it would be completely wrong to let the birthplace of the Non International footballers indicate their "Football nationality", due to the fact that being an eligiable player for Denmark has nothing to do with their birthplace, but only deal with the fact whether or not they posses a Danish Citizenship. At the same time all players with a Danish Citizenship, will however not only have the option to play for Denmark, but can also opt to play for Faroe Islands, if they decide to settle down on the Island -or can proof that one of their parents at some point of time lived at the island for several years. So even if we create a geographical sub-standard, ie. when to use the Danish flag for a Non International footballer, it is still complete impossible to come up with a bullet proof standard. The only standard that seem to work for Denmark, and the rest of the world, is that we stick with the initialy defined Flag policy found at the Club MOS, where the flags always shall display the eligiable nation(s) for the player -and never should be interpretated as the players birthplace/citizenship. Thats why I clearly oppose to the suggestion, to pick either "birthplace" or "citizenship" as a second criteria for Non International footballers. In my point of view, we should keep the criteria strictly bound to the initial definition: Only to show flags for the players "eligiable" FIFA "football nationalities". Danish Expert (talk) 13:58, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Observations
Any change to make the birthplace the default flag if there is no national team representation will have to go through more than this project. The current manual of style states that "Flags should never indicate the player's nationality in a non-sporting sense; flags should only indicate the sportsperson's national squad/team or representative nationality." It's fine to discuss such a proposal here, but any change and implementation would need to be taken through that talk page and probably a RFC. If this is the current practice it goes against the current community consensus and should be discontinued until changes are made to the manual of style. Camw (talk) 09:09, 27 November 2010 (UTC)


 * WikiProject Football currently adhere to the standard defined by its Club MOS, which have included the official template to show the player squad of a club. As part of this currently used template, the current flag policy at WikiProject Football has clearly been established and displayed, to be exactly this sentence at hand:
 * Flags indicate national team as has been defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.
 * So the current practice at WikiProject Football, is fully accepted by the official MOS:FLAG. Lately the core of our discussion, was not whether or not to change the practice, but more how to deal with the so far Non-International players -being without any previous representation of a national team. For those group of players, it seems like we have an unwritten practise, that the FIFA eligibility should only be indicated by one flag, and the flag in those occations should be chosen according to the players birthplace, as this for most players also would be a good estimate, of which national team they most likely would decide to represent, if being called up by the national team manager. According to the official FIFA rules, they define that all Non-International player will be eligible and have a free choise, to represent a national team that match one of the players "Football nationalities". This mean, that if we should be strictly correct according to MOS:FLAG, we should start to:
 * S1) Show all the optional eligibility flags for the so far Non-International players; or if only showing one flag, this need to be backed up with a verifiable source, in order to proof that the player indeed in public confirmed this to be his currently chosen one and only "Football nationality" -if being called up.
 * In our previous latest discussion, Chris suggested we could also define a new standard, simply not to show any flags for all Non-International players at all. And another radical soloution would of course be, if we simply decide not to show any flags at all, when we list the player squads in all of the club articles at Wikipedia. To structure the debate, these two suggestions are now only being discussed above in two seperate chapters. At the same time, this chapter assume we end up with a conensus to trash the two previously discussed more radical proposals, and that we decide to continue using the current standard defined by the official template to show the player squad of a club, but then build further upon that, also to establish:
 * A new clearly defined standard, of how we exactly should list flags for all the Non International players.
 * Danish Expert (talk) 13:58, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Point of order: it is not strictly correct that "the current practice at WikiProject Football, is fully accepted by the official MOS:FLAG" as MOSFLAG proposes you should "Accompany flags with country names", and this template clearly doesn't, per the rather long discussion and even longer RfC. -- Club Oranje T 16:15, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

New formulation of the current headnote in the Squad template
Recently we appeared to actualy reach a consensus in the debate, that we in all circumstances need to improve the formulation of the current headnote in the Squad template. And that it would be a good idea, if one of us write either a full dedicated article about the "FIFA eligibility rules" or a dedicated subchapter within the current FIFA article with the same info, and that we subsequently make a link directly to this new chapter/article in the headnote of the Squad template. To push the debate forward, this section is now dedicated to reach a further consensus of:

1) What should be the exact formulation of a new headnote (please post your suggestion -and the argument to point out why we need the change)?

2) Whether or not we should start to write the new short "Eligibility essay" as a subchapter in the FIFA article, or jump ahead to create a new dedicated article?

Observations
"What should be the exact formulation of a new headnote?" - well, that depends what we actually do, doesn't it?! However, the note should match the reality, which it certainly does not currently. Given the current use, it should state "Representation or birthplace", and should continue to state so until we implement one of the far more sensible options. Knepflerle (talk) 23:08, 16 December 2010 (UTC)


 * According to Paragraph 9.2+9.3+9.4 of the WP:MOSFLAG, now being highlighted in the "Pre Consideration" chapter, we apparently already have some clear rules to stick with. It seems like the previous hatnote -and flag use for players- is in a fine compliance with the overall WP:MOSFLAG. If we want to make a radical change of the flag use for football players, it certainly need also to first reach an approved consensus at WP:MOSFLAG, before we can even think about implementing such a change. For the moment, I believe the best approach is to stick with the previous formulation that: "Flags indicate national team as has been defined under FIFA eligibility rules." Yet it would however be much appreciated, if someone create an article/subchapter to explain the FIFA eligibility rules, where we also create a table, to note each FIFA nations eligibility criteria for playing at their national team. The eligibility criteria variates from nation to nation, so a summarizing table would be highly appreciated. Danish Expert (talk) 21:33, 19 June 2011 (UTC)