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Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Fully professional leagues/Archive 1

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Latest comment: 14 years ago by Jimbo online in topic FAI Premier Division - professional or not!?!
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Argentina Primera B

Latest comment: 15 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Isn't Primera B Nacional Argentina (effectively 2nd division), also fully professional and therefore missing from the list, unless I'm mistaken? -- Alexf42 19:38, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Liga Leumit, Liga Artzit

Latest comment: 14 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

There seems to be a lot of debate going on as to the professionalism of the Israeli second tier and third tier. The leagues are being restructured at the end of this year and the Liga Artzit will no longer be a fully professional league. Let´s stop the edit wars and have a proper discussion. Second, there needs to be corrections made as to the history of Israeli football. The Premier League did not always exist, the Liga Leumit was the top tier before it. As such, players who played then should not be deleted either. SpeechFreedom (talk) 13:44, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

According to this FIFA document (which was published in January), the top two leagues are professional. Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 14:02, 4 June 2009 (UTC)
Also, please don't re-add this as a source, because there is nothing on that page about leagues being fully professional. пﮟოьεԻ 57 08:48, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Definition of Fully Pro League

Latest comment: 14 years ago20 comments7 people in discussion

Can anyone confirm where the wording on this article's page for defining a professional league has come from, as it has added detail to the original (master) guidance at WP:ATHLETE. Has there been a past discussion on this point? Else I would suggest the wording on this page is changed to match that at Athlete. Regards. Eldumpo (talk) 20:45, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

It's a pretty standard definition of what the professional level of football is - all the players are full-time footballers, not part-timers with jobs outside football. I don't see why it would be controversial. Since you seem to disagree with it, what would you consider to be the definition of a fully professional league? -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 20:51, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
So if one footballer in a league is not paid then the league is not fully professional, and thus all players in the league would fail ATH? My comment also relates to how some people in AfD's link talk about WP:ATH to this page, whereas I would argue to do that the wording on this page should be as ATH. Also, for how many leagues is there a source that all players are fully paid? Eldumpo (talk) 21:25, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
As the list stands at the moment, we have 24 sources for fully-pro leagues, plus 3 more for semi-pro leagues. Obviously this list is still in progress. Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 21:31, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
But how many of the sources confirm that 'all first team players, in all teams composing the league, are known to be contracted in a full-time basis.' Eldumpo (talk) 21:51, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
You're not proposing any other definition. Fully professional is a reasonable shorthand for saying that the league doesn't have jobbing (sh)amateurs. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 21:59, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
The definition at ATH is a slightly separate matter. I'm saying that the Pro Leagues page should have the same guidance/definition, but as it stands I can't see why people say a player fails ATH as based on the current wording at Pro Lges, no one would pass it. Eldumpo (talk) 22:23, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
It's a nonsense. For instance, the Scottish First Division has always been conveniently ignored for the purposes of WP:ATHLETE even though there is no guarantee of teams in it being fully professional. The same obvious applies to historical teams. The fact is that this is an arbitary guideline which isn't recognised outwith this particular WikiProject. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 22:11, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
Chris - yes, that was where I was coming from, or at least wanted to understand first if there was a previous discussion. Eldumpo (talk) 22:23, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Eldumpo, what alternative to the current guideline would you propose? From your comments at recent AfDs, you clearly regard anyone playing in the top level of any European league system as sufficiently notable, which is fair enough, but what about lower levels? England's Football League Championship is clearly a much "bigger" league than the top divisions of most other European countries, and even Football League Two is "bigger" than the top flights of countries like Iceland and Latvia...... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 08:58, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I would like to see ATH amended to maybe say something like 'mostly professional' or if 'fully professional' remains it should be more clearly defined - as discussed, I think the requirement for every player to be pro is extreme, why not just apply it to every club? Or there should be a formal link from the main ATH guidance to where there is more detail on what exactly this means for particular sports. However, that is a bigger issue really, for the present I would like to amend the wording on the definition part of this article's page to be the same as the current ATH wording, and not the extra text that has been added. Eldumpo (talk) 08:32, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
The problem would then be defining "mostly". This season the Conference National will probably have about six teams out of 24 who are not full-time - is 75% full-time pros enough to be considered "mostly professional"? Some would probably say yes but others no...... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 12:42, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
Having had a recent read through the ATH talk page it would seem that quite a bit of work would be needed to get a consensus on any change there. However, I have not seen within this discussion any specific disagreement to changing this article's wording in-keeping with ATH and thus this is something I am shortly intending to do. Eldumpo (talk) 18:37, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
  • But what does full-time fooballers mean? There are very high level leagues that have the odd player, who also has a part-time job, particularly during the off-season, to make ends meet; or who brings in a part-timer for a game or two occasionally. Yet we've always turned a blind eye to that. Surely fully professional should mean that all players are significantly compensated; not necessarily that none are moonlighting. And even then, if a league is mostly composed of fully-professional teams ...? BTW, where is this 'list' to which people refer? Nfitz (talk) 01:27, 3 July 2009 (UTC)


  • Further to my earlier posting today (see above) I have just come across the sub-page List of professional sports leagues#Football: Assocation Football which lists professional sports leagues. There seems to be no logic in having 2 separate sections essentially trying to compile the same information, and it is perhaps not surprising that the contents of both lists are not the same. However there is virtually no definition on that article at present of exactly how a 'professional sports league' is defined. Rather than having our own sub-category for football would it not actually be better to delete this Wiki Football page and concentrate on the master location where all sports are listed? Eldumpo (talk) 18:53, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Agreed ... perhaps a redirect is in order. Nfitz (talk) 21:52, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
    • No one objects to this - if no, I'll implement. Nfitz (talk) 03:11, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
      • I object; this list is actually sourced (in places), and has the advantage of also listing leagues which are not fully-professional. пﮟოьεԻ 57 08:18, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
        • But those sources that do exist do not confirm the 'extreme' definition on the page (a definition that is not the same as ATH). Having said that, would keeping the page (but with the definition changed to ATH as my original suggestion) be best - but also with a link to the List of professional leagues? As a general point I would say a normal article is a better source than an informal Wiki page, albeit I except some work has gone into the page, and of course it's not ideal for good pages to disappear when people have put hard work into them. Eldumpo (talk) 20:35, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Here's a question. What does one mean by "contracted in a full-time basis." There are leagues that are without a shadow-of-a-doubt professional where the players are contracted only for part of the year (from the beginning of training to the end of the season). Is that full-time? Nfitz (talk) 23:36, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

FAI Premier Division - professional or not!?!

Latest comment: 14 years ago63 comments12 people in discussion

These sources suggest that it is professional. I can vouch for 80% of the clubs but I am sure some of the newly promoted clubs have a mixture of semi pro and pro players. discuss!

According to this story, Drogheda have gone part-time. As for the other teams, I think most of them are fully-professional. I'll look into it more when I have the time. Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 12:01, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

This is what I've found so far:

Club Status
Bohemians Fully pro [1]
Bray Wanderers (can't find anything definite, but I suspect they're semi-pro)
Cork City Fully pro (but for how much longer?)
Derry City Fully-pro
Drogheda United Semi-pro (probably temporarily until their finances are back on track)
Dundalk Semi-pro [2]
Galway United Semi-pro
Shamrock Rovers Semi-pro (same situation as Drogheda it seems) [3]
Sligo Rovers Semi-pro
St. Patrick's Athletic Semi-pro [4]

Although it is trying, the league is far from being fully professional at the moment. Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 14:00, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

So if these teams were fully pro last season and therefore the league was fully pro last season does that mean that players that appeared last season are notable and players that have only played this season arnt?--Vintagekits (talk) 16:23, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
As far as I can tell, Dundalk, Galway, Sligo and St Pat's have been semi-pro for a while, if not always. I've recently noticed that the BBC aren't always accurate in their reporting. Bettia (bring on the trumpets!) 18:34, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Thats not true, Sligo Rovers are predominantly pro still and were fully pro last year. St. Pats were fully pro until very recently as were Galway. Dundalk are newly promoted.--Vintagekits (talk) 21:33, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
  • So now that we have got proof that the league is indeed fully professional, why are we still tryind to AfD LOI players - see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/David O'Connor (footballer). Nfitz (talk) 23:36, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
    • Er, there is no proof. Shamrock are semi-pro, and it has been pointed out that two clubs (St Pats and Galway) are also semi-pro (having been fully pro in the past). пﮟოьεԻ 57 13:48, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
    • As far as I can see, there is no evidence of all the FAI Premier League clubs being fully-pro, ergo the league is not fully professional in itself. --Angelo (talk) 14:08, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
      • So what is being proposed is that Irish socer players are not notable, it is the highest standard that can be reached in soccer in Ireland which should be notable IMO. WP:ATHLETE is flawed in this case. BigDuncTalk 14:25, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
        • That isn't defendable. Would you say that an Andorran player playing in the top division of the Andorran league was notable under WP:ATHLETE? The guideline is pretty clear - you have to play in a professional competition, or if you can't, then you have to play in the highest possible amateur level. Semi-professional (or amateur) football leagues clearly aren't the highest possible level, since it is possible for the player to be selected for the national team, or for them to move to a professional league. We have to agree on if and when the League of Ireland was professional. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 10:29, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
  • The BBC Article made it clear they were fully pro. They seem more fully pro than many leagues listed. CSL players routinely hold other jobs, but they are listed as fully pro. There's a difference between a team being professional; and paying salaries that would deter people from holding other jobs. Nfitz (talk) 15:05, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
    • What is clear is that the BBC article made a mistake, as they are prone to do from time to time (I recently wrote in to correct them after they claimed there were only 12 Arab members of the Knesset), as they clearly overlooked the fact that not all clubs are fully professional. пﮟოьεԻ 57 15:36, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
      • It all depends on how you define fully professional. If your defining CSL as fully professional, how can you possible exclude LOI? Nfitz (talk) 17:45, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
        • What is CSL? And Number 57 maybe you found a mistake before with the BBC but you have provided no evidence that this is in fact a mistake. BigDuncTalk 18:19, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
          • Shamrock Rover's website confirms that they are in fact semi-professional,[5] so I think that is conclusive proof that the BBC is wrong. пﮟოьεԻ 57 20:22, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
            • Not really. Shams are usually professional - however, they have just gone through a long period without a home ground and are financially "fucked" after getting a new ground and had to switch to part time after the administrators stepped in.--Vintagekits (talk) 11:56, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
              • Yes really - the BBC article was written after the Shamrock article, and is also contradicted by another BBC article written a week after the other one which states that Shamrock are part time. пﮟოьεԻ 57 12:12, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Canadian Soccer League (2006–present) ... why are we holding Ireland to a much higher standard than many of the other leagues? Nfitz (talk) 21:50, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Which players in that league have been kept at an afd because of their participation in that league? I can't recall reading one. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 12:29, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Nor can I ... so why is it there? Nfitz (talk) 03:06, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
  • From reading the source that was used, it appears that they define "professional" like how user:Eldumpo is proposing below, which would include players on very low (part-time) wages. One of the teams in the league appears to be a Toronto F.C. reserve team. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 06:48, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

If and when

I have two questions with regards this technicalities of this issue. Let see if some of the tossers stalwarts from the "footy project elite" can answer them.

  • A. What constitutes a fully professional league.
  • B. If one club has one semi professional player does that make all players in that league semi professional?
  • C. If a league is fully professional in say season 2005 and semi professional in season 1999 do the players that participated in the 2005 season pass notability and those from 1999 not? --Vintagekits (talk) 08:58, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Placing insults to one side....
  • A. a fully professional league is where the vast majority (ie 99%+) of players have their primary job as a football player, which is their career. Fully professional players aren't butchers, bricklayers or candlestick makers who also play football on the side to supplement their income;
  • B. no, most youth players at professional clubs continue to study while they train with a club. eg from back in the day, Billy McNeill played for Celtic at 18, but didn't become a full professional until he was 21;
  • C. yes, that would be correct. Same applies if a league restructures - the Scottish First Division has recently been fully professional, but the second level of Scottish football wasn't fully professional when there were only two leagues in the Scottish Football League, and all the professional clubs were in the top division. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 10:37, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
  • A. So is that 99%+ ruling something you have come up with or something that is a little more concrete? Is that something you have implamented elsewhere or just reserved for Irish leagues?
  • B. Again, although it is alighed to point A, if one club, say a newly promoted club, have five or six players out of a squad of fifteen players which were semi pro would that make the players in the whole league non notable on that basis?
  • C. So we are agreed that a league can be acknowledged as fully pro and then semi pro on a season by season basis?--Vintagekits (talk) 10:56, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
  • A: "Ruling"? I'm not a judge, we are trying to reach some sort of consensus - there is nothing more concrete. The guideline says that for an athlete to be notable they have to participated in a fully professional competition. Now, this is easy for individual sports like tennis or golf - if you take part in a major tour (eg PGA Tour), you're professional. Same goes for even the liks of cricket or rugby, there is a pretty clear division between what is fully professional (eg Magners League) and what isn't (eg1 Scottish club rugby outside the two pro teams, eg2 Irish club rugby outside the provincial teams).
The League of Ireland is an unusual situation. For most of its history it clearly wasn't fully professional, eg Bohemians were amateur until the 1960s and were semi-pro for a while after then, but more recently money has come into the game and it has for the most part gone professional (although it seems to be toiling now). I think there is a danger of recentism and accepting articles from earlier periods because the league was (briefly?) professional in recent times. To answer the second point, I have frequently nominated Scottish players for deletion because they haven't played at a professional level (eg1 Daniel Galbraith (footballer) or eg2 Jordan Cropley right now). It is much easier to prove whether this is the case or not.
  • B: I would tend to accept that case, but we would need some sort of consensus on that. In that situation it is clear that the club is intending most (or all) of its first team to be professionals, while supplementing the squad with part-timers.
  • C: Of course I agree with that. It looks very likely that the Scottish First Division will go largely part-time soon, many of the clubs don't have the crowds (and resulting revenue) needed to sustain professional football. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 11:17, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

There is no existing Wiki definition of what a 'fully professional league' is, although note that the term used at WP:ATH uses the slightly different wording - 'competed at the fully professional level of a sport'. My preference (given the current wording) is to adopt an approach whereby all clubs in the league have to pay some of their players i.e. this conforms to the wording as it's fully professional - all clubs are playing some money to the players. Your points B & C on one semi-pro and historical issues illustrate to me why the approach at present is not practical or fair. Eldumpo (talk) 21:12, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

That wouldn't work. To give an extreme example, East Stirlingshire F.C. gained some notoriety a few years ago for paying their (part-time) players £10 per week. By your definition they would have been professional! Jmorrison230582 (talk) 21:21, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
When you say it wouldn't work though, do you just mean that too many 'non-notable' players would be added? ATH is just a guideline though and so any entries would still need to have some notability and references. Occasionally a really low-ranked player might slip through, but wouldn't that be better than all these discussions? Eldumpo (talk) 20:46, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
You know what? In Italy all teams pay money to their players, even in Terza Categoria. It is called "rimborso spese" (expense reimbursement) in Italian language, and it is money being paid by the clubs. Are therefore all teams affiliated to the Italian federation professional? I doubt it. --Angelo (talk) 22:13, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
If it's only expenses reimbursement that's not the same as 'getting paid', but I take your point. Is an another approach to say that if an individual is paid to play then it's acceptable, rather than basing it on the league? Eldumpo (talk) 20:50, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
They call it 'reimbursement', but actually it is not a reimbursement - surely not for Serie D clubs, where some of their players receive 'reimbursements' even higher than salaries of several Lega Pro Seconda Divisione players. The fact individuals are paid is irrelevant; the kind of agreement they have with the club (as a full-time job or not) is. --Angelo (talk) 21:50, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Guys this is an emotive subject and I can see why. There are alot of ppl trying to create articles for the wiki on individual players. This takes time and effort and is very frustrating to see them getting deleted on what I perceive to be a technicality. For the likes of Derry, Bohemians, Cork City, and in the past Sligo Rovers, Galway United, Shelbourne etc. these have been fully professional football teams and a full time pro that played for any of those sides at those times was obviously "playing at the fully professional level of their sport". This "technicality" that every player of every team must be proven to be fully professional is ridiculous. (By the way Dundalk went fully pro when they were promoted - ppl can hold down two jobs).

The other point that I want to make is that WP:ATH is a guideline. WP:SPIRIT is another guideline too, that is all too often forgotten. I feel that the spirit of WP:ATH is to prevent non-constructive wiki-ing. It prevents ppl slagging off their team mates in their local junior team, or putting up self praise articles about themselves after they get a hat-trick in the U12's local highschool league. It should not be used to prevent the creation of a knowledge base on Irish football players which on all evidence would be and is very useful! I have seen many of the articles that I have written used in match day programs and player profiles before they got deleted off the wiki. DavidDublin (talk) 09:07, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:SPIRIT is an essay, actually. What you define a "technicality" is actually a rule of thumb that is described by WP:ATHLETE. In addition, the fact matchday programs have to rely on Wikipedia articles is not an argument against deletion; Wikipedia is not a primary source, as you probably know, and I might also claim they are using Wikipedia because they fail to find any other more reliable source elsewhere (it is just my opinion, of course, but it might be quite true as far as I know). --Angelo (talk) 09:41, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
This is what WP:ATH states: "People who have competed at the fully professional level of a sport", which the vast majority of Premier League of Ireland players would satisfy. There is no stipulation that every player in the League that they play in should be professional. DavidDublin (talk) 10:25, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
No they wouldn't. "level" refers to the division or league a club is in, not the club itself. For instance, there may be a club in the Conference North that remains fully-professional; however, the level at which the club plays (6th tier) is not. пﮟოьεԻ 57 10:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
We can get into semantics over the definition of "level" if you want. But at the end of the day WP:ATH is a guideline see WP:GUIDELINES. You're taking an extremely inflexible interpretation of the WP:ATH guideline. I'm not saying to ignore the guideline but I believe that many Irish Football players have reached a "level" that merit a wiki page for ATHELETIC notability (not general notability, after all they are athletes and notable for nothing other than that). I believe the interpretation taken on Athletic notability is too inflexible, when you consider that most of the players in the League of Ireland that survive AfD it's for General Notability but not Athletic Notability when generally they are only notable for being athletes. This to me indicates that there has been a fair bit of harshness in the interpretation of WP:ATH. —Preceding unsigned comment added by DavidDublin (talk • contribs) 10:58, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
What is WP:ATHLETE based on though? The point about professional level is that the player himself not only has to be professional, but his competitors also need to be professional. For instance, a golf club teaching professional would not be notable, but a golfer competing on the PGA Tour would be notable. Therefore we need to establish that the competition as a whole is professional, not just that one player or his club. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 11:03, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Take the example of the PGA Golfer. He also competes frequently in lesser competitions for example the Irish Open which is open to amateur golfers too, indeed an amateur golfer won it this year! Does that mean the example PGA golfer's level is no longer fully pro anymore ? There is no doubt that a player for Bohemians will play in several contests between fully professional teams this season, including their match coming up against Red Bull Salzburg. On the face of it, they are playing at a fully professional level. It's just my opinion that the inflexible application of WP:ATH is going against the spirit of the guideline. I've made my point now and that's all I will say. I'm aware the more I type, the ppl opposing me will begin to stick their heals in more and instead of changing opinions I'll force them to be more set in their ways and to defend their side more staunchly. Basically, I'm not going to change minds that are already made up. —Preceding unsigned comment added by DavidDublin (talk • contribs) 11:37, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Well, that's a case where we apply common sense. Everyone knows that the Open Championship is a notable professional event, but the organisers so happen to reserve spaces for amateur champions and qualifying places. But in the Irish League it is fairly clear that there are semi-professional clubs regularly participating. We do have to draw the line somewhere. In the case that you're talking about where Bohemians will soon play a European match against another professional side, then the players in that match would pass WP:ATHLETE, in the same way that a player with a Scottish or English club who hadn't played a league match would become notable (eg Darren Fletcher made his Man Utd debut in the Champions League). It would be up to whoever was contributing to the article to reference that appearance, then the article would not be in dispute. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 12:49, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the reasonable reply Jmorrison. I can agree with that. DavidDublin (talk) 13:27, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

David - thanks for the above input. I agree with what you say and it gets to the heart of the issue. However I would hope that you do contribute further to the debate and to individual AfD's (as you feel appropriate). I would like to clarify though that 'competed at the fully professional level' is not the same as saying the player has to be solely paid by his club and not be able to accept other paid work (this is not proveable for all players in any league anyway). There also has to be some reasonableness as to when a league (or indeed a cup) is effectively fully-pro bar a small number of clubs say.Eldumpo (talk) 21:07, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Moving forward

  • From the discussion above it looks like we have come to some sort of an agreement that the FAI Premier Division is not fully professional this season but that over that past few years that it was and that it slips in and out fo full professional, mostly professional and part time dependant on the particular season, the ecomonic climate and the teams that have been promoted or relegated. Would we all agree that that is fair to say?
  • Also we seem to agree that players who played in Eurpoean competition achieve professional status - is that fair to say. Would that also apply to those who have participated in the Setanta Cup? Thoughts and comments please.--Vintagekits (talk) 14:14, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
    • I think the solution would be to try and bring WP:FOOTYN round for debate again. This would have meant that any player playing for a fully-professional club was notable, regardless of its league. I was supportive of this guideline, but it was not accepted by the wider community, hence being forced to stick with WP:ATHLETE
    • Regarding playing in Europe as conferring notability, I think we would be opening a can of worms - some editors have tried to use this for justifying keeping articles on players from semi-professional clubs (such as ones from the Faroes). пﮟოьεԻ 57 14:24, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
      • I think playing in Europe is okay as long as the match is clearly between two professional clubs, it's the same principle as saying a match between two professional clubs in a domestic cup is enough for WP:ATHLETE. I don't think the Setanta Cup would help as you are talking there about a mixture of clubs - from memory, Linfield are the only fully pro team in the north. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 15:16, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
        • I think all players who have competed in Champions Lge/Europa Lge should be included, but in any case I would expect all of these teams to pay their players. Eldumpo (talk) 22:01, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
    • I think we can all agree there is a world of difference between a semi-professional team from the Faroes, and a part-time fully-professional team from Ireland. Nfitz (talk) 02:30, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
      • "part-time fully-professional", I'm sorry, that's nonsense. If a club is part-time, which means that their players only train twice a week and they hold down regular jobs, they are a semi-professional club. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 06:20, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
        • Agreed, "fully professional" is a synonym for "full-time footballer" and there is clearly no such thing as a part-time full-time footballer. There clearly isn't a world of difference between players from the Faroes who hold down day jobs and train a few evenings a week and players from Northern Ireland who hold down day jobs and train a few evenings a week, or at least if there is then I'm really struggling to see it....... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 08:17, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
          • Agreed, never heard of a part-time fully-professional player or team. I think I know what you are trying to say - i.e. the club has a full time set up with full time paid groundsmen, chairman, secretary, managers etc - but with some/all of the players on semi pro contracts.--Vintagekits (talk) 08:30, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
Which is, of course, what "semi-professional" already means.
The simple fact is that when it comes to semi-pro teams and players, we're far better going by the GNG than by trying to draw a firm line. If we can find multiple, independent reliable secondary sources then we can cover things, and if we can't then we can't. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 09:00, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
I think you're on the right lines there except it would need an agreed term for 'semi-pro' etc, although I guess it's academic unless ATH changes. Eldumpo (talk) 10:29, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
            • I reference you back to the question I asked above in then, that no one could answer. Nfitz (talk) 03:32, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
              • Which question? Jmorrison230582 (talk) 09:50, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
                • The last entry in WT:WikiProject Football/Fully professional leagues#Definition of Fully Pro League. Surely a team is either professional or amateur. If some players are professional and some are amateur it is semi-pro. If all players are professional it is fully-professional. Full-time and part-time are a different issues ... and for an individual player, he is either professional or not ... surely for an individual (rather than a team) to be partly professional is as impossible as being partly pregnant! Nfitz (talk) 19:53, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
                  • This is getting ridiculous comparing professional football to some thing with no relevance what so ever - it's not all black and white, which is what why we're discussing the grey areas. The long and short of it is, not paid = amateur (Sunday league/park football), paid on part-time basis = semi-professional, paid on a full-time basis = fully-professional. I'm not getting involved with this farcical discussion from here on. --Jimbo[online] 23:34, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
                  • I don't agree with that. If someone is holding down a normal 9-5 job and then trains on weeknights and plays a match on a weekend, he/she is not a full professional at their sport. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 20:03, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
        • (to Jmorrison post) - what about clubs which have some 'full-time' players, or indeed those that have one player who is not 'fully pro'. What if there is only one such player in the whole of the league! (not that there would be sources for this). Eldumpo (talk) 10:26, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
          • I answered that earlier. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 09:50, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
            • I can't see where you've answered the 'full-time' question? Your post that I was responding to was about 'part-time' clubs, where players only train a few times a week (with the implication that they also need another job). But what about 'semi-pro' clubs where some players are 'fully-pro'. Eldumpo (talk) 13:16, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
              • A player is not fully-pro or semi-pro. What does that mean? If you are contracted with an employer, you can have either a full-time or a part-time contract. Full professional is something that can apply to the club (when all of their senior footballers are contracted in a full-time basis), or leagues (where all of the composing teams are fully professional). Period. --Angelo (talk) 13:21, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
                • In my posts above I am generally using quote marks to indicate that the terms are not fully defined or sourced and are up for interpretation so I don't see how you can realistically add 'Period' at the end of your post? In English football the general terms full and semi-pro are often used, but clearly to pin down definitions is difficult (and goes to the heart of my concerns with the wording). What is the perceived definition of full and part time contracts? Do all clubs stipulate weekly hours on their player contracts or are some effectively time-charge? What if a player is paid for what is deemed to be a 'full time' contract but the wages are quite low and he supplements it by other means? Eldumpo (talk) 07:51, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
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