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French wikipedia... needs some help

Hello everybody, I'm trying to improve Australia National Cricket Team on French Wikipedia in order to have soon our first cricket-related featured article (and I hope it will be followed, soon, by the nine other test nations, even if it's difficult). Unfortunately, I have some difficulty to get some pieces of information... but I can find nearly everything I want on the Internet. The question I'd like to ask (if somebody knows that) is : I've found that Bob Simpson was the first ever australian full-time coach for the national team. Before they have a full-time job, who coached Australia national cricket team ? Nobody ? The captain ? A selector ? Would you have some exemples ? Thank you... OrangeKnight 17:16, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Heads up

Just a heads up, I've nominated two of the infoboxes for deletion: see today's TfD log. Hopefully pretty straightforward as the templates are unused, but I thought you guys might like to know. Cheers. AllynJ 09:39, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Possible free images

I have found potential images for both Yuvraj Singh and Virender Sehwag. They are from the U.S. Embassy New Delhi website and from my understanding works from by the US government are in the public domain as stated here. Now the pic in question is a group photo of the cricketers (plus Harbhajan) and I am useless at photoshopping or anything to do with pictures. If you think the picture is legitimate for use on wiki could someone please extract them. http://newdelhi.usembassy.gov/gallery20.html Thanks, Crickettragic 04:59, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Image - Fair use?

Hi., can someone look at whether this image qualifies for fair-use? I have used it in the current FLC and a reviewer has challenged the use of the image. Can someone review and let me know and i shall then proceed to do the needful. --Kalyan 12:03, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, an image can't simply qualify for fair use. The use of an image in a particular way may or may not be fair use. The rationale on the image page needs to spell out that you are claiming fair use in 2003 Cricket World Cup statistics. This is important, as the question that needs to be asked under criterion 1 of the fair use policy is no longer "Is there a free image illustrating Tendulkar's award?", but "Is there a free image that would do just as well in that part of the list?". Apart from that, I find it hard to see how the use of the image "significantly increase readers' understanding of the topic in a way that words alone cannot", as required by criterion 8. JPD (talk) 13:52, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Notability guidelines

We have clear guidelines for whether cricket players are notable, but has any thought ever been given to what guidelines are appropriate for other cricket people? I'm thinking of umpires, administrators, writers, journalists and broadcasters. I'm not sure that the Wiki guidelines regarding biographical articles in general are much help.

The simplest thing to do with umpires would be to use the same guideline as for players, ie having officiated in at least one f-c or List A match. For writers I would suggest having published at least one "proper" book. (By "proper" I mean not having been published by a "vanity publisher" and the publication having been more substantial than a booklet.) For journalists, I suggest having regular articles in the national press, the local press not being sufficient. (There could be problems with some countries that are so large in area that they have few if any national papers, though.) The guideline for broadcasters would be similar, substituting "station" for "newspaper". I've left the administrator category till last, as this is the most difficult. Of course, many cricket administrators have other claims to notability, which helps. All of the above would of course only be guidelines, and some people not strictly meeting them might still be thought notable. I haven't considered statisticians separately, as statistics aren't much use unless they are published, so they will generally fall under writers. JH (talk page) 19:07, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

I think we discussed umpires some time ago and I have been assuming the same guidelines apply as for players. The vast majority of first-class umpires are former first-class players in any case.

Statisticians, historians, artists, writers and the like: I think they have to be considered on individual merit because a pamphlet or booklet can be highly significant. For example, one of the most important writings in European history was What is the Third Estate? by Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès and yet it was a "mere" pamphlet. I agree that journalists and broadcasters must work for national rather than local outlets.

With administrators I would say the secretary of a first-class club is the minimum qualification but again I think they should be considered on individual merit. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 19:52, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

One further point. The reason for deleting the ACS-related articles (see above) was because they were written to emphasise each subject's membership of the ACS committee as the basis of notability. The articles were created by someone with a vested interest and they were products of systemic bias, as the AfD discussion agreed. Wikipedia's own guidelines about notability make clear that membership of a notable group is insufficient; the individual must have notability in his or her own right. If one or more of those ACS people does have individual notability that was not previously apparent, given the emphasis on ACS rather than on the first-class match he once played or the significant book he once wrote, then the article should be recreated with the emphasis duly shifted. Wikipedia's guidelines make clear that the article itself must describe and clarify the subject's notability: all those ACS articles did was say that "so-and-so is a member of the ACS committee and he has helped to publish a few ACS booklets". When the article about Robert Brooke in particular was expanded to emphasise his own publications, it was removed from the AfD nomination. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 06:38, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Naseem Ashraf

Just a note that I have delisted this page from GA, due to serious POV problems and BLP violations sourcing criticism from a blog. Please check to see if I had a brain explosion or anything. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 05:54, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I think your brain is all right: the article is poor in terms of neutrality and pretty badly expressed in a lot of places. Johnlp 07:17, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

On a side note, I don't think the aricle was actually nominated for GA and passed properly - certainly, I find no trace of a GA review listed anywhere. The closest thing is on the talk page of someone suggesting it be taken to GA; and if there really was no proper review it should've been delisted anyway. If memory serves a user passed it without so much as a word (though not under a WP:COI or anything as far as I can tell), and I bumped the rating up to reflect it without checking the article myself. Hmm. (The things we do when we're new eh?) AllynJ 09:34, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Both keepers scoring double hundreds

Is the feat of opposing wicket keepers Read and Foster both scoring double tons in the same match [1] a unique one? Nick mallory 10:14, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Images

Image:Bowlinatsomerset.JPG is an image that, aside from Cameron White on the right, I don't know who the others are. So I'll leave it here if anyone wants to find plafes to put it. If you look at the bottom of my user page you will see my other cricket images that you can put where ever you like if youc an find more places for them than I have :) SGGH ^speak! 10:19, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I *think* the guy bowling is Steffan Jones and the one on the left is Mark Turner. Nowhere near entirely sure on either account - infact it could be those two but the other way around. AllynJ 10:35, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Thats Mark Turner from a picture I took, though admittedly not very helpful! :D SGGH ^speak! 10:39, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I spotted that one, hehe. Although looking at the picture again, I'm not at all sure of who is who of the three on the left; although I am pretty confident that two of them are Jones and Turner (just not sure which ones). PS, I'm basically judging it against the pictures on their Cricinfo profiles from the scorecard of the match on the day the pics mention (here - assuming that's the right one?) if anyone else wants to give it a go, btw. AllynJ 10:43, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Infoboxes

Hello. I have been creating articles for bangladesh cricketers and a point which was made by user Moondyne was that I have been using the wrong infoboxes when I was creating new articles. I have been using Template:Infobox Recent cricketer when the cricketer has played both first and List A cricket and Template:Infobox Old Cricketer when the cricketer has palyed only first or list A cricket. Could someone please tell me if I am using the right infoboxes or not so I can use the right infobox if the ones that I am using at present are not right. Thanks. 02blythed 11:38, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's necessarily you're using the wrong infobox for it, but rather that you appear to be substituting (WP:SUBST) them in to pages - this should never be done with the infoboxes. For example, see what this page looks like when edited, and compare it to this one - the first is using the template and identifying which values need to be updated is simple, quick and easy; whereas in the second you have to check between all the wikicode being used. AllynJ 11:51, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Hello. I do mean to be rude but I do not really think that updating the records of players is that hard really or as hard as you are making out. The first example that you showed me would be easier to update statistics but I do not think that the one of mine that you used for an example is really that difficult to update really or not as hard as you are trying to make out. I think that it is easy to update the statistics when needed to. As said previously I do not mean to be rude but I do not think that the way I do the infoboxes is really a big issue because even though there is a difference I do not think that people would find updating the statistics for the cricketers in which I have created infoboxes for that confusing. 02blythed 12:09, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

It's not that it's too difficult, just it is slightly more confusing than having every variable appropriatley labelled. Also note there are other reasons for doing this: say one of the infoboxes needs replacing due to a pending merge, or perhaps even a full revamp of the infoboxes. If the template is substituted on to the page then there's no record on Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Infobox Old Cricketer for people to be aware of what does and doesn't need replacing. Indeed, if the template is changed for even a minor change such as a formatting issue then when it is changed at the template level it will automatically update any transcluding the infobox - whereas if it's substituted nothing will change.

What I don't quite understand is why you are substituting it - I'm assuming you are doing so? You basically do all the hard work in using the template and then do something that changes how it appears on the page, which as far as I can tell makes no sense... AllynJ 12:24, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Hello. I am not substituting it or meaning to anyway. When I went onto the infobox recent cricketer for example and I clicked onto edit this page in which then I could see the wikicode ( I think this is what it is called) and can therefore just fill in the blanks for the new cricketers that I create. I did not mean to substitute if this is what I have done. Could you please send me the appropiate wikicode for someone that has played first class and List A cricket please and also someone that has played only First or List A cricket too to my talk page so I do not make the same mistakes again. Thanks. 02blythed 12:36, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Based on some consistent minor errors I see there, I'm guessing 02blythed is not subst'ing, but is copying the table code from another article. eg. the tables don't have a trailing "|}", and there's a fragment of irrelevant text in every one. As long as you start to use the infobox code copied onto your talk page it should be OK. —Moondyne 14:07, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Frank Evershed

What do you guys think about this guy? Is he going to end up on AfD because his one match was not of first-class status? Having made one County appearance for Derbyshire I immediately made the assumption he was notable, but now, I'm not so sure. I would hope his family history would qualify him if people were being super-lenient, but I won't be slighted if it gets deleted.

What say you guys? Bobo. 12:55, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Shhh. Just keep quiet about it and probably no one will notice. ;-) Johnlp 18:42, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Bingo. Bobo. 20:11, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Bangladeshi names

Am I right in saying that, in general, we don't need to have a category sort key for Bangladeshi and Pakistani bio's? For example, Ejaj Ahmed should be filed under "E" and not "A". What are the rules exactly? I vaguely recall that this has been discussed here previously but am too lazy to search for it. —Moondyne 07:19, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Wisden has all Pakistani and Bangladesh cricketers listed under their first name, irrespective of their relegion. The same format is followed by Cricketarchive. So if you search for "Zaheer Khan" in CA, it will come up with the names of two Pakistani cricketers, but not the Zaheer Khan - for him, you have to search for "Z Khan". Similarly, full-names are used for those like Tapash Baisya (who is not a Muslim) and a search for "Tapash" will bring up his name. So if you strictly follow CA, that will be a bit of a mess, but I guess the answer to the first question is yes. Tintin 07:58, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm helping Blythed do about 10 new Bangladeshi players a day. They're under a 'Bangladeshi players' cat but I haven't put their names in because I wasn't sure which way round it went. I would go with putting the first name first personally otherwise it just gets too complicated. The problem with that is that many of them technically have a first name of Mohammed which isn't actually used to identify them. Half of them would be Mohammed something or other. So do we ignore the Mohammed and use their second name as the first name in their cat name, if you see what I mean? Maybe someone should ask blythed. Nick mallory 03:40, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Hello. I do not know about which way round the names should go into the categories so I cannot help you in that respect. 02blythed 11:20, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Hi. The convention does seem to be first name usage. Not only Wisden but the BBC has always done that. I vote yes to the original question as I think we would be best not to try and do a category sort here or we risk the same sort of confusion that Tintin has described. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 10:11, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Vandal alert

Someone blanked the page of South African cricket team in England in 1998‎ last night and it was promptly reverted by an admin who spotted it via the popups facility. The same culprit, using an IP address, then tagged the page with the "db-nonsense" tag which among other things sends an automated message to me as the original author. But another admin saw this, removed the tag and placed a warning on the talk page of the culprit. I saw the automated message this morning. In case this person is going to clobber more cricket pages (and perhaps South African ones), please be aware. I see his only other activity to date has been on Mein Kampf!!

His action against our page backfired because I'm presently working my way through the tour pages and this one was on the list to expand, so all he achieved was a slight change of my schedule! --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 10:19, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

W.G. Grace

Article needs one heck of a bunch of citations, notably this ([2]). Help requested. --Dweller 13:21, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

I've heard that train one (or car, lorry, bus, etc) about a number of players in numerous countries, and suspect it's an Urban Legend! Andrew nixon 13:27, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

The "it is said" pretty well implies as much. A large number of apocrhyphal stories have grown up about him because of his "larger than life" status. I think there's something to be said for retianing a few so long as their dubious status is clearly indicated, as they tell us something about the way he was viewed at the time. JH (talk page) 16:43, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Properly cited, I'd have no problem at all. It currently reads like hogwash, as pointed out by a recent vandal to the article! --Dweller 16:46, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

I have heard this about some others but not about WG. It definitely is not one of the popular WG stories (unlike, for instance, Ernie Jones and the beard, putting back the bails after being dismissed first ball, Charles Kortright's "there is still one wicket standing" etc), and IMO, doesn't deserve the benefit of doubt. Tintin 16:59, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Is the broomstick story in the next line true ? Tintin 17:01, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Liam Plunkett

Liam Plunkett's article has too many different sections, and about a sentence or two in each. Like a section on his driving ban and his "biography" are not in the best of shape. Speedboy Salesman 09:43, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

So do something about it. :) JH (talk page) 09:55, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Seems fair enough as his bowling is usually all over the place too. Nick mallory 09:57, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Worst ODI runs:caps ratio

Unless there's an error on Cricinfo (it's been known to happen!) I'd like to nominate James Kirtley for this. His batting stats for ODIs are:

Played 11, Innings 2, Not outs 0, Runs 2, High score 1, Average 1.0

I make that a ratio of 0.18 runs per ODI.

Has anyone with more than (say) 10 caps got a worse ratio? --Dweller 13:30, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

"The Invincibles"

Hi. At the suggestion of Blnguyen, and with The Rambling Man agreeing and myself interfering there's now three of us thinking of working toward this WikiProject's first featured topic - the 1948 Australians.

Please see User talk:The Rambling Man for the origins of this and discussion regarding a special (ie no precedence!) squadbox.

Cheers, --Dweller 13:33, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

If anyone knows of the best books for this task, in describing the tour itself and chapter profiles of the players then please advise me. The books available to me can be found here. Thanks, Blnguyen (bananabucket) 01:22, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Good luck with it guys, certainly an important part of cricketing history and a fully deserving idea for a FT. Unfortunately I'm not able to help (I have absolutely no resources short of the limited amount online, most of which is probably on here, as well as not being familiar with the tour in any great detail) but if I can give you one piece of advice it would be to change your lead article (presuming Australian cricket team in England in 1948 is what you are looking at being the lead now; it doesn't really "fit" if you get me -- one would expect a FT on the tour to be, well, about the tour; not the players involved. Creating an independent article on The Invincibles to be the lead article would probably be your best bet, with Australian cricket team in England in 1948 and the players as the articles included as the sub-articles. Just a thought, anyway. As I said, best of luck. AllynJ 01:46, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I think that's a fair point. A FT around the tour should have worthy articles on the matches, the grounds and all sorts of ephemera. Re helping - there's loads to be done that doesn't need access to books etc, like proofing, adding cn tags, structuring etc. And there's a lot of material online through Wisden - players' obituaries, for example, the detailed review of Bradman's career from when he retired and match reports from the 1949 Wisden. --Dweller 10:20, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

This seems like a very good idea but can we be clear about what a "topic" actually is? It seems to me that it is a group of articles with one article as the designated "lead" and that to date there are only 15 such topics on the site.

Further, it seems that all the articles within a topic must individually have at least GA-class if not FA-class. Which indicates that it is a tall order because there were about 17 players in the party plus a manager and you need to include the article about the tour and the article about the 1948 English season. It might also be an idea to include articles about some at least of the key English players such as Len Hutton. I would be inclined to bracket the tour and season articles with those about the 1947-48 and 1948-49 Australian seasons (in the sense of preliminaries and aftermath). For completeness, you need to look a little further afield and include the Aussie visit to Ceylon, en route to England, where they played at least one first-class match.

I have a fair bit of material about this period and if you would like me to get involved I will do what I can to help, although it won't be my first priority. I'm always glad to be a reviewer. Good luck. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 19:15, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

All members of the squad now have their batting graphs in order, thanks to a template that Raven4x4x emailed me, I have done the graphs. I did not do one for Toshack, Saggers and Hamence since they played less than ten innings so there isn't much point there. I didn't do one for Johnston since his average was 11 and HS was 29. Only a quarter of his innings passed 10 so it didn't semm useful. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:41, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Stub

Please see the thread at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Miscellaneous#Cricket_test_match_in_1951. :-) --Dweller 13:20, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Nonsense?

Can someone (or a few people) who know cricket please review these edits to check for their accuracy? We got an e-mail saying it was all nonsense, and I figured I would let you handle it because you definitely know more about cricket than I. :) Thanks for any help you can provide. Cbrown1023 talk 14:54, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

The whole article is a hoax. I have prodded it. JPD (talk) 15:49, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Thank you so much for your assistance! :) Cbrown1023 talk 22:19, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Alan Kippax

I have just completed a biog of Kippax and would like to nominate it for feature article. I think that the importance rating should be changed from low to mid, as Kippax is one of those players whose Test records don't quite reflect his importance in the game. Cheers.59.101.198.148 05:13, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I think you should get yourself an account, since you are sharing your IP with vandals and some people will not take you seriously in spite of the fact that you make quality edits. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 05:18, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

In fact it's WP Australia for which he has a "low" rating, which is probably fair enough for that project. He didn't have a WP Cricket rating. I've now supplied a class rating of B, since that is the highest that I can assign off my own bat, though the article might well pass the GA process, and an importance rating of "mid". JH (talk page) 09:17, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Shee-eeesh...ok, You nominate it then...I s'pose this puts Bradman out of the ball park, too...lol.59.101.198.148 06:06, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm not nominating it, else it would move me from about 160th to 110th in the FA rankings even though it wasn't my work. There's nothing prohibiting IPs from nominating, and the problems I was referring to usually come from bureaucratic users disrespecting people who contribute content. In other words, not us guys or the atricle people who judge FAs. But there are lots of benefits from having an account. one, it doesn't show your IP and physical location, secondly, you can edit articles like Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid and sourav Ganguly which are locked to stop anons from vandalising. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 01:01, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't understand, is the article nominated or not? BTW, I'm not interested in editing Tendulkar, Dravid or Ganguly, what makes you think I would be? 59.101.198.148 04:07, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

The place to nominate Kippax for featured article is WP:FAC. Go for it. Tendulkar, etc. are only examples of articles that currently require you to have an account to edit. There are indeed many benefits, but in the end, it's your choice. JPD (talk) 10:19, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

• It's nominated. The discussion is here [3] Nick mallory 12:31, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

And I added a batting graph.Blnguyen (bananabucket) 01:28, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

List of first-class cricket records

The "History of Cricket" infobox seems to me to be rather an odd one to find in the article, as few of the entries seem all that relevant. I assume that the infobox is there because it's also in List of Test cricket records, where its rather more (though not very, IMO) relevant. Any thoughts? JH (talk page) 19:12, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Pardon the pun, but this thing is an "historical oddity". It dates back to the early days of cricket history on the site and was introduced by jguk to summarise what we had at that time which, as you can see, was not very much. Since then, we have grown and the infobox has not grown with us. I think it predates categories too. On balance, I think we should delete it. It no longer serves a purpose and to try and develop it would be a hopeless task. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 21:59, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't feel strongly about it but an alternative is to chop it back to something like:

History of cricket
To 1696
1697 to 1725
1726 to 1815
Tests to 1883
Tests 1884 to 1889
Tests 1890 to 1900
Tests 1901 to 1914

—Moondyne 00:38, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Infobox now changed. —Moondyne 08:31, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I like what you've come up with. JH (talk page) 08:55, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

En dash

"When referring to a cricket season spanning two years, use an hyphen (or an en dash) and the last two digits of the second year as in International cricket in 2005-06 or New Zealand cricket team in Zimbabwe in 2005-06. However, if the years do not begin with the same two digits, write out the full year: 1899-1900."

I have altered the above statement in the Cricket article style guide to comply with Wikipedia:Manual of style guidelines. 2005-06 should have an en dash, not a hyphen. Epbr123 08:29, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

H'mmm! I do use – quite a lot but not in a winter date such as 2006-07 because there is no fast keyboard route. Or is there? I tend to use en dash as an alternative to colons. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 05:37, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Worcestershire "home" grounds

The "Grounds" section in Worcestershire County Cricket Club lists all the grounds at which Worcs have hosted first-class or List A cricket. However, I believe that because of the flooding, at least two "home" games will be played at the grounds of other first-class counties (Edgbaston and Taunton, I heard). Should such games be added to the main table, or mentioned separately? Loganberry (Talk) 23:08, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Mentioned separately. Worcestershire aren't using those grounds as home grounds, the matches are being moved to neutral grounds. Andrew nixon 23:25, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Right; that makes sense. But presumably the game being played at Kidderminster does count as a home game? Loganberry (Talk) 11:48, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Aye. If it's a normal Worcestershire home ground, then it's still a home match. Andrew nixon 15:17, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with Andrew. The grounds outside the county are neutral venues and Kidderminster is a home ground. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 05:39, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Bangladesh First Class Cricketers

02blythed has just completed his project of doing an article on every first class player in Bangladesh. Well done Blythed. Nick mallory 03:51, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

• Well done, 02blythed. Great work. It reminds me that I did start splitting Bangladesh players into 20th century and 21st century once upon a time so I'll make a note to continue that in due course. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 05:44, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

• And also well done to Nick who wrote most of the bios. [4] —Moondyne 05:49, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Paul Collingwood

What do you all feel about this edit which combined Collingwood's two infoboxes into one long (confusing) one? Not only does it make it difficult to edit, it untidies a lot of the section headings. Is this a rogue edit that has slipped through the net? –MDCollins (talk) 09:48, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

It looks very messy and of course where a player is still active in so many forms of the game then it will need to be readily accessible to be updated. Would probably matter less for a retired player, but I'd suggest going back to two separate infoboxes, or even waiting until players retire before doing the non-international infoboxes at all. Johnlp 15:30, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Batsman/bat

Which do we use? To me, right-hand bat looks a bit silly. It implies that the player is a bat. A dictionary.com search for bat does not reveal any definition for the word bat along the lines of "Player batting in cricket", whilst batsman does. Batsman is used for women's cricket, so there is no gender-neutral problem of any sort with its use. I'd like to reach a consensus on this, as one user does seem to have a habit of changing batsman to bat. Andrew nixon 12:29, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Batsman, definitely, because the women use it about themselves. I think we discussed this before. Stephen Turner (Talk) 14:04, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I seem to remember it coming up once before. One user has gone through a handful of articles about Ugandan players today changing all instances of right/left-handed batsman to right/left hand bat. It seems a little petty to make that one change to a perfectly acceptable article. Andrew nixon 15:17, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Definitely batsman. Changes such as the Ugandan ones you mentioned should probably be reverted in the absence of a convincing explanation - and certainly should be if there's no explanation at all. Loganberry (Talk) 00:02, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

"Batsmsn". "Bat" sounds horrible. JH (talk page) 16:30, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Always Batsman for both men and women, never, ever 'bat'. The person who changed the articles should be told. His talk page his here [5]. He was told about this in January but is still doing it in July. Strange. Nick mallory 02:58, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

We should definitely use batsman. I think the modern media has something else to answer for here as I have heard TV commentators referring to a right hand bat. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 05:50, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

The use of "Righ(left)-Hand Bat" etc has a very long history, but is rarely used in prose, only in summary. Cricinfo and Wisden as far as I know use the term x-hand bat pretty much all the time in player summaries. --LiamE 15:56, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

That does not mean it's correct though. To me, and to possibly most English speakers, the phrase "right-hand bat" literally means "bat for a right-handed person". Plus, as I said, the dictionary definition for bat does not include any meaning that could mean batsman. Andrew nixon 14:29, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

I beg to differ. I don't know what dictionary you checked. I've just looked in 3 and they all have something similar to the OED definition of bat which is..."noun 1 a shaped wooden implement for striking the ball in games. 2 a batsman...." So, the dictionary argument is out of the window, and usage by cricinfo, wisden and others seem to think its fine. As I say its not often used in prose these days but is nearly always their choice in summaries. --LiamE 21:00, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Steven Marsh

This guy has two separate pages at Steven Marsh and Steve Marsh (cricketer). I just added merge templates to both, but don't have time to do a proper merge, nor to decide the best name for the article. -dmmaus 06:25, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

 Fixed —Moondyne 10:01, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

and Infobox added! –MDCollins (talk) 10:17, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Keith Miller

Is everybody sure that this guy [6] is Keith Miller (sorry, I'm not able to recognize him) ? If it's true, I suggest to had it on Miller's article, because this photograph is by far better to illustrate it than any other... OrangeKnight 02:53, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

that's him. I uploaded that. About 10 more ar home scanned from the book. I'm reading up on him as well.Blnguyen (bananabucket) 03:33, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

OK, a good photograph for his infobox ! OrangeKnight 04:17, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

The old gang are back

The Rambling Man and I are cracking our knuckles in preparation for doing an FA drive on a bio of one of the 1948 Australian Invincibles, another building block toward the goal of a featured topic.

Unbelievably, we've lost User:ALoan's good-humoured copyediting expertise, which is nigh-on irreplacable. However, all and any of you are welcome to participate... some of you are expected ;-)

Because he's lazy, TRM has suggested we take on one of the lesser lights of the squad, a bloke who was called Donald Bradman. Heard of him? I doubt he's notable, let alone deserving of a FA, but TRM is a hard man to say no to.

Anyway, it'll be a ball. And you're all invited. --Dweller 11:35, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Lazy?? You took most of June off boyo... The Rambling Man 11:58, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh yes, so I did. Shall I speedy Bradman for failing WP:BIO? --Dweller 12:05, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Shame: I felt sure you would pick Ron Saggers for the Invincibles FA drive. Johnlp 13:47, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it was a close-run thing, but that Bradwing dude, or whatever he's called, just pipped him. --Dweller 14:30, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

:). I should go and polish off Harvey and Morris and Tallon and Johnston. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:08, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Small irrelevant question about the WI article

It's pretty much nothing to do with the article, but has the flag image for the West Indies that's been uploaded got darker? I mean the maroon (for lack of a better word) has got darker since the last time I looked? Sorry to trouble everybody which such a non-question as it were but I would like to know. Speedboy Salesman 17:59, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Well spotted. The edit summary by User:Andrwsc reads "uploaded "Image:West Indies Cricket Board Flag.svg": Created from Commons version, which was originally created by User:Zscout370. I have updated the background color to match the shade of maroon shown on the WICB website"

–MDCollins (talk) 22:12, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Maiden ODI Fifty

Hi. I wrote this article as it was requested to be created. Pretty much all it is is a stub, but i've put the Cricket Portal link on there anyway. Could it be extended, or merged into another article? Bizzmag 21:47, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it will serve any purpose as an article in its own right - I can't really think of any examples in which linking to it will serve a purpose (Tendulkar scored his Maiden ODI Fifty verses x in 19xx) is about all I can think of. Regardless, it should probably mention cricket somewhere... –MDCollins (talk) 21:59, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Agree. Article has been {{prod}}ed. —Moondyne 10:15, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

The stub should be integrated into Cricket terminology. Gizza^{Discuss ©} 11:25, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Shanthakumaran Sreesanth's name?

According to a section in the Guardian's over-by-over commentary, he considers his name to be "Sree Santh", saying further that "There is no Shanthakumaran, there is no 'S' Sreesanth. There is no Sreehantha." If this is so, then the article should be moved. The problem is that there doesn't appear to be any further backup to the Guardian's story. Does anyone have a solid source for "Sree Santh"? Loganberry (Talk) 02:53, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Might as well leave it I think. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:57, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

IIRC, the BBC website's match report referred to him as "Sree Santh". JH (talk page) 07:50, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

The BBC report does indeed use "Sree Santh". I think it is important to move the article if we can be sure that "Sree Santh" is the name he now wants to use. We moved Yousuf Youhana to Mohammad Yousuf, after all. Loganberry (Talk) 17:18, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Well yes, but, we're supposed to use what's commonly used, even if wrongly. See everyone still says "Colon" Powell. So I think we should keep it in the common name and write and etymology section to discuss the controversy. As previously there were rumours that he was going to change neames to Sreesunth. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 00:58, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Digging further, I see that the scorecard of the match on the BBC site still uses the "Sreesanth" form, as do CricketArchive and Cricinfo in their player profiles. So it might be premature to change it. (Though I'd be surprised if the Guardian interview with him was incorrect in its quotes.) JH (talk page) 17:45, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I wondered reading those articles whether they are transcriptions of an audio recording and are open to interpretation. He might have meant that he wants to be known by one name and one name only "Sreesanth", stressing the "Sree-santh", or by two: "Sree Santh". Unless/until this is clear, it may as well stay where it is rather than move it twice, but just make clear how he wants it said (as it does at the moment). Either that or ask Bill Frindall! –MDCollins (talk) 22:05, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

My best advice would be to put redirects to the Sreesanth article so that whatever people call him, it will always go to the same place and will be of minimal trouble to do.Blackhole77 14:29, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Well:

• A comment on Talk:Shanthakumaran Sreesanth refers to this article in the India Times which claims he has decided to be called Sree Santh for numerological reasons.
• The BBC here says "... Sree Santh - that's the name he wishes to use after being referred to as S Sreesanth, Sri Sreesanth and by his full name, Shanthakumaran Sreesanth..."
• And The Independent here says it is to do with the South Indian naming systems - "For years he was plain Sreesanth, the name given to him by his parents, or S Sreesanth at a stretch, the initial standing for Shanthakumaran, which was his father's given name..."

I think you pay your money and take your choice. - -- !! ?? 18:30, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Bradman in popular culture

Hi. I've asked the Australian WikiProject (Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Australia#Donald Bradman FA drive_-_request_for_help) for help with this, but I'm looking for notable usage of Bradman's name as a metaphor for outrageous excellence. Could be in politician's speeches or whatever and needn't just be by Aussies. I've also seen an excellent suggestion from our resident etranger (sorry, my French is worse than my sense of humour) that we extend this search to usage of "Bradmaneque", particularly outside of cricket. Help welcomed. Please post to Talk:Donald Bradman. --Dweller 14:09, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Not too bad ;) ! OrangeKnight 00:56, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

In Adelaide a few years ago they renamed the road from the airport into the city from Burbridge Rd to Sir Donald Bradman Drive. There happened to be a "adult products" shop on the road, which decided to include something Bradman in its new name. They got sued. Don't know what the result was. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 00:49, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

WP:AWNB is the where the Aussies congregate, oddly enough. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 00:47, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Featured Article in French (let's hope)

I request some help in order to, maybe, have the first Featured Article on cricket on the French Wikipedia : fr:équipe d'Australie de cricket (Australia national cricket team), before doing the same work for the other test teams. I don't ask you to read the article (or if any of you speak French, he can of course !), but I'd like to ask some advice : do you think that the structure seems good ? I just have to finish some parts of the historical aspects (1950-75 and 1987-1999). I've made it as follows (I give you some key words if necessary) :

• 1/ Historical aspects, divided in :
  • Aboriginal tour and first tests (1868-1880)
  • Birth of the Ashes and English domination (1881-1896)
  • Facing England again and again, but not only (1897-1914) -> first series win, triangular tourmament, etc...
  • Between wars (1920-1938) -> 1920-21, 1930 tour, Bodyline, etc...
  • Invincibility and "Invincibles" (1946-1949) -> the Invincibles
  • (Here I don't know what to choose as a title : High and low ?) (1950-1975)
  • Dark years and rebel teams (1976-1987) -> World Series Cricket, Underarm delivery incident, Defeats from 1984 to 1987, Rebel tour of South Africa
  • Rise to World domination (1987-1999) -> Two first World Cup win, 1995 tour of West Indies,...
  • World domination (2000-2007)
• 2/ Shirt and symbols -> history of coloured shirts, Baggy green
• 3/ Main stadiums
• 4/ Players
  • Eligibility
  • Current team -> contracted players
  • Best players -> players of the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame, and I've added Steve Waugh, Warne, McGrath, Ponting, Gilchrist, which are not (yet) in the Hall of Fame... Should I had Bevan, Mark Waugh, Healy, Don Tallon among the "legend" players for their records/performances ? Anybody else ?
  • Coaches (from Simpson to Nielsen)
• 5/ Statistics
• 6/ Social and economical aspects
  • Media -> first radio broadcast, "synthetic cricket", first television broadcast, contract with Channel Nine, Internet broadcast
  • Popularity of players -> Songs, movies, "Australians of the Year", ...
  • Attendances in stadium
  • Contracter players' wages

I think I've not forgotten any of the main event of the history (apart from those that I've not yet written, such as the first tied test, the tied World Cup semi-final, the Ball of the Century, the bookmakers' scandal in 1998).
I thank you a lot if somebody can have a look on this structure... If you have any suggestion, please leave it on my talk page if necessary... Thanks a lot !
-- OrangeKnight 10:11, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

That's a brilliant piece of work, well done. If you want a suggestion the 1950 - 75 section looks like it needs beefing up to me. Nick mallory 10:59, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks... I need indeed to develop the 1950-75 section... Would you have an suggestion for the title of this one ? OrangeKnight 11:12, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Well 1949 - 1977 is the period between Bradman and Packer really, two men who had a vast influence on the game. "From Bradman to Packer" perhaps. Nick mallory 10:30, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

OK, that's a good idea ! OrangeKnight 10:49, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Talk:Cricket#Requested move

It is that time again... Gizza^{Discuss ©} 08:54, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Hook Shot

In reading an article (circa 1950) about Denis Compton by Jim Swanton, Swanton mentions how Compton is the master of all strokes. Interestingly, Swanton feels the need to explain what a hook shot is but not any other stroke. Does this mean that the hook shot is a relatively new innovation (surely doubtful) or is it a new name for an old stroke? Or was Swanton an old duffere even then? --Roisterer 03:19, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Well it was definitely known during Bodyline. Stan McCabe famously repelled Bodyline with his fearless hooking. No I didn't write that int he article! Blnguyen (bananabucket) 03:21, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

That's what I figured. I just don't understand why Swanton, who was writing to a cricket audience and refers to a number strokes (sweep, drive etc.) without the need to explain what they were, decided he needed to explain what a hook shot was. --Roisterer 04:03, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Could he have been making a distinction between the hook and the pull? Even now shots that are pulls rather than hooks are sometimnes incorrectly called hooks. Or maybe he had been asked to write an article of so many words about Compton, had found he had come up a couple of hundred words short, and so had inserted an explanation of the hook! JH (talk page) 09:09, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Lots of {{PD-old}} images here

http://www.leski.com.au/catalogues/a301/TCRI.php —Moondyne 07:25, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

WP:CRIC style help

When referring to international/county teams we refer to England/Somerset. What would happen in cases such as "Andrew Flintoff went on the England A tour of Bangladesh." Do we link to Bangladesh cricket team, which has more relevance, or the more accurate Bangladesh.

I usually use the former, linking to the team, if this is correct can it be added to the style guide? –MDCollins (talk) 11:22, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I think the latter should be used. After all, in the sentence above, Flintoff toured Bangladesh, not the Bangladesh cricket team. Of course, the link should be Bangladesh national cricket team, to avoid redirects! Andrew nixon 12:58, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

But in that instance, there'd be no point in linking to the country as it has little/no context (do they go sight-seeing?), and would involve linking twice (once for the country and once for the team). It would also mean duplicating the word twice

• "Andrew Flintoff went on the England A tour of Bangladesh. In the first Test against Bangladesh he scored 12 and took 3 wickets."

Instead of, perhaps

• "Andrew Flintoff went on the England A tour of Bangladesh. In the first Test he scored 12 and took 3 wickets."

or

• "Andrew Flintoff went on the England A tour of Bangladesh. In the first Test against Bangladesh he scored 12 and took 3 wickets."

Another option would be to link to the tour article:

• "Andrew Flintoff went on the England A tour of Bangladesh"

Just trying to be concise, yet still link to the most relevant article. –MDCollins (talk) 13:16, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Marcus Trescothick

Is anyone free and willing to peer review or copy edit Marcus Trescothick - any views welcome as its now a very substantial article.

Thanks, –MDCollins (talk) 11:41, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

This information should be added somewhere

This is an interesting article here on cricinfo but Wikipedia could not help me when I wanted to find background information on the series and this occurence in particular. Perhaps someone can write about the events of this article here. 58.178.148.161 08:32, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

The article on Lala Amarnath is currently really only a stub, though not flagged as such. It has a brief paragraph about the incident, which could do with expansion. Indian cricket team in England in 1936 is currently very much a stub, but I expect that someone will get around to expanding it before too long. JH (talk page) 08:59, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

I've added a short overview of the matter in the tour article, including the cricinfo linkage. I'll update the article fully in due course. I am currently working through all the tour articles. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 06:28, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Laxmi Ratanb Shukla

Take your pick between Laxmi Ratan Shukla (3660 Google hits) and Laxmi Shukla (1080, including his entry on Cricket Archive), but this article is currently misplaced, most likely misspelled. Anyone with a brighter idea than myself please feel free to move this to the correct place. Bobo. 04:38, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I am for Laxmi Ratan Shukla, because the middle name usually used when referring to him in the media. See how often Ratan in appears in match reports in a plain search for Laxmi Shukla in google Tintin 04:47, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Twenty20 Cup 2007

I would just like to say thanks to all the users who helped in editing and regularly updating the twenty20 cup 2007 page. All we have to do is the finals day!

Not adding a comment, allowing the bot to auto-archive this section (original message was missing a timestamp so the bot ignored it). AllynJ 17:54, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Matt Prior

What's the current world record for byes conceded in a Test innings? --Dweller 11:47, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

36 37 I think. Bearders said something around that figure half hour ago on TMS –MDCollins (talk) 11:57, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

here –MDCollins (talk) 12:00, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

That should have been a quiz question! Another random piece of cricket trivia I heard from David Lloyd's commentary on the Eng vs Ind match today was that 10 August is only remaining day in the year when an ODI has not been played on. 2607 ODIs have been played in total. Gizza^{Discuss ©} 12:02, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Apparently Les Ames strained his back in England's first innings, and missed the rest of the match. Frank Woolley (recalled for a final match, aged 47) was deputising behind the stumps (presumably there ought to be some kind of dagger marking for his catch of Arthur Chipperfield).[7][8] -- !! ?? 12:42, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

A bit unfair for cricinfo to only record the designated -keeper, Ames heading the table for the most byes conceded while off the field!! Surely he could have let the record sail pass him as well :-) –MDCollins (talk) 13:14, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Kent have produced many of the best keepers to come out of England in the last 100 years. Dear old Frank Woolley was not one of em. --LiamE 13:36, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

So just 8 needed to tie, as I write, with 4 wickets left. He could manage that in two balls. It's on... --Dweller 12:47, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Prior should try catching the ball with his mouth, he wouldn't drop so many then. To be fair every commentator has said most of those byes should have been called as wides by the umpires and were swinging so far down the leg side that Prior stood no chance of stopping them. Is Dhoni on for one of the fastest double centuries in history? Nick mallory 13:47, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

The record for most byes in a three Test series is 72 (Jack Blackham, Ashes 1893). Prior is 66 and is, sadly, unlikely to get there. Tintin 13:53, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I dunno... a quick-scoring but feeble English effort that just avoids the follow-on leaves India quite some time to bat, as does a large English effort that leaves the Indians with, say a small lead. An English follow-on would be disastrous for his efforts to win a place in cricket history. --Dweller 14:04, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Four more, now... Just need another 4 byes to tie the record, but with only on wicket remaining... OrangeKnight 16:06, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh well, equal highest for a 'proper' keeper. –MDCollins (talk) 16:24, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Damnit, can't he do anything properly? --LiamE 21:58, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

The TMS commentators keep saying that many of Prior's byes should have been wides. I wonder if the previous records were created by similar umpiring infelicities. -- !! ?? 09:53, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Good news for Prior, follow on not enforced, plenty of opportunity to claim that record... The Rambling Man 10:58, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

He's missed his chance for the record books. --LiamE 15:58, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Infoboxes

This thread has been summarized below... Perhaps I've missed this because I've been away, but User:Joe p15 has set up a new infobox for international cricketers and has changed several current players to the new set-up. The latest example is Monty Panesar. Has this change been discussed and approved by consensus? I know we've had various attempts to rationalise the number of infobox types, but I don't recall this individual contributing to those or debating the inclusion of the information that is now being inserted. But perhaps it happened while I was away. Johnlp 21:29, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

First I've heard of it too. No consensus as far as I've seen - I quite like it but might need tweaking before we all agree on it. Should we revert it per no-consensus? If the style is good, other boxes could match it. –MDCollins (talk) 21:39, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

I'll drop him a note on his talk page suggesting he comes here and establishes a consensus before doing more. He may not realise what a task he's setting himself with the numbers of Test cricketers there are. I think they look quite good, though I worry that information in a tabular format makes us look more like a directory than an encyclopedia. Johnlp 21:51, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Some issues I'd like to see addressed are:

1. equal column widths for Test/ODIs (as per existing convention);

2. If the club-logos are used, auto transclusion would be nice, so typing "Yorkshire" will transclude the logo and the link to Yorkshire.

3. It does have a draw back as it now looks different to an awful lot of cric infoboxes (although that should stop a discussion on whether people like the style.

Others may become evident, but the majority has obviously been lifted from existing infoboxes (hence it is just cosmetic rather than structural). –MDCollins (talk) 22:11, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Hello! Sorry I didn't realise there was such a process to go through otherwise I would've discussed it. I'm relatively new to this thing! I just felt that when you look at most of the other sports (football, rugby league/union, golf etc), the players' infoboxes show a basic background of the individual. I thought that it would look good if we had the same for cricketers. I think I've only changed about 4 players so they can be easily changed back if needed. Could you point me in the direction of where it has been/should be discussed? I like to think I'm competent with the code but by no means am I an expert so help with some of the issues would be much appreciated. Thanks Joe p15 22:28, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Here is a good as place to talk cosmetically as anywhere mate. If anything technical comes up, the template talk-page might be better if other editors want to help you implement things. I'm sure if everyone agrees to this, you'll have a lot of support/assistance in rolling it out by the thousands!

While I'm nitpicking at it with you, another thought is that

4. the current club in effect duplicates the latest club-by-date information and could be omitted. This would also remove the 'England county clubs' header and avoid the need to change it for different countries.

–MDCollins (talk) 22:34, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Yea, I wondered about that aswell, do you think a list of former clubs would be appropriate or just scrap it altogether? Joe p15 22:38, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

How about this (excuse the bad formatting)

Club information

1993-present Yorkshire (squad no. 7)

1990-1993 Hypothetical first-class club 2

1988-1990 Hypothetical first-class club 1

There may not be room for the squad no. on that row, you'll have to see (nice touch that though)

If there is room, I'm sure there is a way to implement that using the "clubnumber" field you have used, but my technical limits might be pushed there. –MDCollins (talk) 22:47, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, I'll give it a shot, I'm waiting for my new job to start so I got a lot of spare time at the moment! You might have seen from the number of edits on it so far, its very much trial and error! Joe p15 22:52, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Posted on talk page for technical thoughts.–MDCollins (talk) 23:03, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Fine to talk tech there, but let's keep the discussion on the generalities here, please. Johnlp 23:09, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Sure - was just trying not to bombard this page with technical suggestions, that, knowing my infobox capabilities probably won't be much use! –MDCollins (talk) 23:14, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Ok, so I've half solved issue 1 and solved issue 4 (see Darren Gough for example, next on the list is issue 3! Joe p15 00:15, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, 4 is good. Before you do much more, I'd wait for other views. Don't try and either make it look like existing boxes, see what people say about this one. People might have thoughts on the logos, so I'd wait before trying anything too fancy with them either. –MDCollins (talk) 00:23, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I think the transclusion is beyond my capabilities. Best I could do is provide a key for each county with the documentation. What you think? Joe p15 11:18, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Interesting. I quite like the change, the infoboxes as they stand are a bit bland, and this could definitely be a good change. A couple of things I'd like to throw in to the hat for consideration:

1. Using one infobox for all players. As it stands we can get something close to that with Template:Cricketer Infobox; the use of parser functions is great. As it stands trying to remember which template does which is horribly confusing, and if we go ahead with this new style I'd personally prefer to see just one to use.
2. I think the flag's a bit too big, perhaps we could change it to just being an icon in the top left, image mapped to the national team? Something like User:AllynJ/Sandbox (I've fiddled about with the template to demonstrate at User:AllynJ/TemplateSandbox if anyone wants the code): this is currently still very much a WIP; having trouble with the imagemapping, though. (Doesn't seem to like dynamic image addresses, which of course the country variable brings about. Grr.) Update, flag issue fixed. I'm currently getting an error on all 3 template pages though (the original, my sandbox, MDCollins's sandbox) in the dateofbirth template. I'm assuming that's not actually an error though as I can't see anything to do with it.
3. Role. As has been spoken of before in multiple areas (I can't remember half the links at the moment, I'll drag them up from the depths later) that role is almost always subjective. Obviously with Gough/Panesar it's clear-cut but deciding whether someone's an all-rounder or not seems to consistently be too subjective to be neutral, but at the same time it is highly important to clarify. I think we need to come up with a consensus for this once and for all (player pages only, nowhere else, perhaps?).
4. Source variable: Should be changed from saying [{{{source}}} Cricinfo.com], not only do we not always use Cricinfo but it's also incredibly inaccurate re: various players, especially South African ones from the whole rebel tours/apartheid/etc. era. Just leave it as [{{{source}}}] if I was you so people can put [http://cricinfo.com/playerprofileurlhere.html Cricinfo.com]. Avoiding inaccuracies is better than saving someone typing out/copy and pasting Cricinfo a few times.
   

S'about it from me for now. Ta. AllynJ 12:09, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

1) Do you think a function to change Test and ODI to FC and List A would allow the box to be used for non internationals?

Yes. And as with the above mentioned infobox, it would allow for all 4 stats on players where it's applicable. (See Paul Collingwood where this is already in use using the old style. Whoops, see how up to date I am! :x See here, hadn't looked at the article in a while.)

That's fine, but I think 4 columns is a bit excessive. Others I've seen have used the career FC later in the article. The function to change any other the columns, to perhaps the 'highest' two' might be worth while. –MDCollins (talk) 12:53, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

2) Personally I prefer the flag underneath the image so that, if there isn't an image available the flag can fill the gap. I agree it could be slightly smaller though. See what others think.

It definitely needs to be smaller, aye, but I quite like how it looks now if you check my sandbox. But I'm a bit of a minimalist, so I can see other people disagreeing.

Smaller yes, but not convinced by the minimalist one yet...–MDCollins (talk) 12:53, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

3) I disagree that its "almost always subjective"! Most roles are quite obvious, however I agree that some cases may be ambigous, e.g. Collingwood (can someone with a test bowling average over 100 really be an all-rounder?!), Yardy, Dalrymple etc? Perhaps we could set some parameters to go by for ambiguous cases? I don't know, suggestions please!

I meant always always subjective with all-rounders, sorry, hehe. Obviously McGrath isn't one(!), but Collingwood, Tendulkar, Kumble? Vaas? The list goes on of borderline players.

4) Agreed! - Thank you Joe p15 12:38, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Another one of a similar thing I've spotted is in the {{{currentsince}}} variable - as it stands, it puts "-present" on the end, which would make implementing this for players who have retired a bit odd. AllynJ 12:44, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

This can be solved by using club2 for retired players I think (although the if command for the header will need adjusting. –MDCollins (talk) 12:53, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

At the risk of confusing things, an updated template is available in my sandbox, addressing User:AllynJ's concerns, but omitting the flag for now. I've also implemented facility for the Test cap number, and International debut dates etc... Also sorted some column width issues, reducing the overall width of the box. Demonstration here. –MDCollins (talk) 12:38, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Freeze for a minute? Can we stop changing lots of them and try and combine some (ie discuss/combine mine into the origina)? I'm getting lost! –MDCollins (talk) 12:58, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Ha, sure! How about you put the international information in to start with (including the flagicons i'v put in your sandbox? Joe p15 13:02, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Ok - not sure about the flags, a lot of people see them as unnecessary and that Flags are taking over the wiki. Can I suggest we leave them out for now, but have a full discussion with others first? Also the use of the county logos might fail the fair-use criteria that is supplied (This tag is meaningless without an accompanying fair use rationale which must be unique to the usage of THIS image in each article in which it is used. You must also give the source and copyright information for all fair-use images uploaded.) I'll update it without the flags for a minute, but keep them in my sandbox...–MDCollins (talk) 13:06, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Done (minus flags for a minute). Doc updated as well. –MDCollins (talk) 13:29, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Good work, we shall await opinions! Joe p15 13:38, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Ok. We should summarize the above really in a new section. Its so complicated. I'll have a go in a minute. What about the ODI shirt numbers here - room for those? –MDCollins (talk) 13:42, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I've been wondering about the fair-use bit for a while now, only with regards to Image:West Indies Cricket Board Flag.svg. I'm fairly sure it's incorrectly tagged as reproduction of copyrighted logos is still subject to copyright, and thus should only be used on the team's page; but I'm not in-touch enough with fair use and copyright to be certain. Hmm.

The template looks good now, though. I can think of a decent way for it to show Tests/ODIs/FC/List A, I'll throw up a copy on User:AllynJ/TemplateSandbox2 (oh god this is going to be even more confusing :p) until it can be integrated. AllynJ 13:46, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Okay, all done. The basic idea is that if the international tag is empty then it won't show the debut & cap data, nor will it show the international stats. No way of hiding the domestic stats because every player has some so making them optional seemed rather odd. It required a fair amount of changing |'s to {{!}}s, and there were some coding oddities (for some reason there were 4 columns in some areas and 3 in others? Wasn't sure why, but normalised everything) but on the whole shouldn't be too hard to merge if people like the idea.

Other than that, I think we're overusing the parser variables some - if a player isn't an international then no one's going to be entering anything in to the Test debut, Test caps, etc. section regardless; would be easier to merge in to one variable (which I've also done on TemplateSandbox2). Cheers. AllynJ 14:50, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

What happens if they only played Test Cricket/First Class? Does it still work? Otherwise, good.

I wonder if all four sets of stats might be too long, that's why I was wondering about being able to selecting just Test/ODI or First class/List A - room for discussion. What happens if they only played Test Cricket/First Class? Does it still work? Can we code "column1=Test" "column2=FC" for example? I tried to make it all 4 column to shrink the width (re. squad numbers) but didn't seem to happen.–MDCollins (talk) 15:05, 13 August 2007 (UTC)