The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. The issue with the keep votes is many focus on items such as his being young, and there will be a great career in the future, they are likely to attract more attention in the future, etc. While used as ratiionales to keep, these rationales are most often used to delete via WP:TOOSOON. On the other side, it is hard to ignore the majority viewpoints on it failing GNG for a lack of significant coverage in reliable sources. WP:GNG is the gold standard for inclusion, regardless of what Projects are involved, and the authority from which all other sub-notability guidelines derive their authority. With that in mind, there is a clear consensus to delete. Perhaps next year this young player will attract more coverage, but for today, the consensus is they do not pass the threshold for inclusion. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 20:37, 13 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Tarek Aggoun[edit]

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Tarek Aggoun (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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Barely passes NFOOTY with a few appearances in the Tunisian League. However, he fails GNG comprehensively. I have found no sources that show significant coverage. The article itself only has one. ArsenalGhanaPartey (talk) 14:50, 3 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  • You are well aware, than NSPORTS has a lot of caveats about when GNG sources need to be provided. You are also aware that NSPORTS allows for discretion (in both keeping and deleting), and the long-standing consensus in the project is that articles for young players who are active, are created when they are capped, and then kept for some time. You should also be aware that that NSPORTS is neither a pillar nor a policy - but merely a guideline. Presumably you are aware that guidance (and even policy) only documents already-existing community consensus - if consensus differs from guidance, then the guidance should be revised accordingly. Please stop following an overly strict interpretation of the letter of policies without consideration for their principles. Nfitz (talk) 07:31, 6 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    What happened to the claim that he definitely obviously has SIGCOV from having appeared in multiple professional games? Now the argument seems to be he's young and active (despite being released by CSHL...), and also NSPORTS is just a guideline that must be WRONG since someone like him is clearly notable regardless of a demonstrable lack of sources. JoelleJay (talk) 22:29, 6 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm sure that you are aware that is entirely consistent with the long-term consensus and precedent in this project. The bottom line is you trying to change consensus. At some point that becomes a WP:Disrupting Wikipedia to illustrate a point. Wikipedia, like both the English language, and common law, is not governed by hard-and-fast rules, but by context and precedent. Nfitz (talk) 06:01, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    You mean like the consensus * There is clear consensus that no subject-specific notability guideline, including Notability (sports) is a replacement for or supercedes the General Notability Guideline. Arguments must be more refined than simply citing compliance with a subguideline of WP:NSPORTS in the context of an Articles for Deletion discussion. from the well-attended 2017 RfC that sports editors just immediately decided to ignore? Or the consensus from the hundreds of deleted articles on athletes meeting NFOOTY but not GNG? Or the consensus referenced by the closers of dozens of narrow AfDs of athletes meeting an NSPORT subguideline but not GNG? Or the consensus that shaped NSPORT's original and ongoing requirement for GNG, as evidenced by explicit statements to that effect in numerous places on the guideline? Keep !votes based on meeting NFOOTY are shorthand for "this subject is expected to have SIGCOV if we look in sources from the right time and in the right languages". This is a rebuttable presumption, and I have rebutted it by searching the archives of 27 of the largest sports news outlets across two countries in three languages and linking those search results for participants to look at for themselves. His coverage remains exclusively non-significant and transactional, and as he was released by his Tunisian team we don't even have a basis for WP:CRYSTAL claims of an "ongoing career". JoelleJay (talk) 06:43, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Source assessment table:
Source Independent? Reliable? Significant coverage? Count source toward GNG?
https://globalsportsarchive.com/people/soccer/tarek-aggoun/241692/ Yes ? No Statistics only ✘ No
https://www.worldfootball.net/player_summary/tarek-aggoun/ Yes ? No Statistics only ✘ No
https://www.fkblansko.cz/clanek.asp?id=Zahranicni-posily-do-obrany,-dres-Blanska-obleknou-Koraksic-a-Aggoun-2919 No Football club that hired him Yes No Single paragraph of coverage ✘ No
https://directinfo.webmanagercenter.com/2021/07/13/ligue-1-le-cs-hammam-lif-engage-un-attaquant-tchadien-et-un-defenseur-algerien/ Yes Yes No Only coverage is that he has transferred ✘ No
https://www.kooora.com/?n=1079856 Yes Yes No Only coverage tells us that he scored a goal ✘ No
https://www.kawarji.com/actu-70261-l1-tous-les-transferts-du-mercato-hivernal-2021-2022.html Yes Yes No List of transfers ✘ No
https://int.soccerway.com/players/tarek-haggoun/536255/ Yes Yes No Statistics only ✘ No
This table may not be a final or consensus view; it may summarize developing consensus, or reflect assessments of a single editor. Created using ((source assess table)).
BilledMammal (talk) 03:10, 9 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • My only error is that I meant a score, not scores - the nomination implied he'd only had a few Tunisian WP:FPL games, which is false. This AFD runs completely against the long-established consensus that once a young player gets a fully-professional cap, that it's okay to create an article. There is no need to Wikilawyer by cherry picking a guidance document, and playing up stuff like Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention - but ignoring the rest of the sentence that says "but it does not need to be the main topic of the source material". Meanwhile others complain about the overwhelming bias towards English-language players - yet few would be suggesting that a young active 4th tier player in England would not be notable - yet here we have people going after players who play in fully-professional East European and African leagues. Nfitz (talk) 18:38, 10 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • How is it cherry picking to note the need to also meet GNG? Between the primary document and its explanatory supplements it notes it multiple times. It's hardly buried in the footer somewhere. And I'd be more than happy to find a reason to keep - which reliable source(s) would you say are more than a trivial mention (indeed, significant coverage) but not its primary topic? Please highlight and I'll give a second read immediately. Regarding yet few would be suggesting that a young active 4th tier player in England would not be notable I mean, if they don't have significant coverage in decent sources I would definitely be viewing them as not notable, and so would many others. Nosebagbear (talk) 21:20, 10 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Even if one defines "SIGCOV" as "anything more than two sentences" he still wouldn't meet GNG, as the only pieces that devote three sentences to him are the various translations of the announcement he was transferring to CSHL, which count as one source as they're not independent of each other. Not that it goes beyond routine transactional coverage anyway. Meanwhile others complain about the overwhelming bias towards English-language players - yet few would be suggesting that a young active 4th tier player in England would not be notable - yet here we have people going after players who play in fully-professional East European and African leagues. The only people who would insist such a 4th tier English player was notable in the face of overwhelming lack of coverage would be the users who systematically !vote "keep meets NFOOTY". And I'd like to know which publications you'd expect to see discussing him in depth that aren't among the 27 I already linked. JoelleJay (talk) 23:36, 10 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Is BilledMammal's source assessment table a correct representation of available coverage to pass/fail WP:SPORTCRIT?
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, — Coffee // have a ☕️ // beans // 21:12, 10 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - And he's now joined a new club; Viktoria Žižkov in the fully professional Czech second division. Can we please end this AfD on a player with an active career now? Davidlofgren1996 (talk) 19:24, 25 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
He didn't receive any coverage when he was in the Czech second division before, why would we presume he will now? JoelleJay (talk) 22:43, 25 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The collapsible FAQ at the top seems very straightforward. The topic-specific notability guidelines described on this page do not replace the general notability guideline, among others. As a general note, I fail to see how stats and transfer announcements can be turned into something encyclopedic, regardless of whichever notability guidelines one prefers. Avilich (talk) 00:04, 26 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Aggoun has two more trivial roster mentions in Czech regional sports media since his transfer (which didn't seem to be covered itself): Prazsky, Jcted. His transfer has not been covered by the Arabic sources I checked: RadioSabraFM, Essahafa, Al Chourouk, Akher Khabar, ShemsFM, JawharaFM, El Khadra. Really not seeing what the holdup is in closing this as delete. JoelleJay (talk) 03:19, 6 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Who says this is a delete? Feels like an easy "no consensus" close to me. NemesisAT (talk) 11:06, 6 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
As I said above, because the NSPORT guideline requires all subjects meet GNG, and while this must be demonstrated with sources "eventually", the only reason the "eventually" provision exists is to allow editors time to search the historic/non-Anglophone sources that would be expected to cover the subject. All of the keep !votes presume these sources exist by making the "meets NFOOTY" argument; that presumption is eliminated if a comprehensive search in the relevant non-Anglophone media shows the coverage does not exist. The two !voters who claimed GNG sources do exist have not provided them and have not contested either my findings or BilledMammal's source assessment table. !Votes based on a presumption that is later determined to be unsupported are discounted in the same way those based on coverage in particular sources are discounted if the sources are later determined to be unreliable. JoelleJay (talk) 17:28, 6 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
As we've gone over before, editors disagree on that interperation of the guidelines, which contradict themselves. The gudieline itself doens't actually require it, only the FAQ which incorrectly summarises the guideline. So the keep votes are still valid, even if you disagree with their reasoning. NemesisAT (talk) 18:27, 6 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The FAQs were established by NSPORT consensus and would not be included uncontested in the guideline page if they weren't supported. The majority of good-faith editors have no problem understanding the guideline once it's explained to them; that a minority cannot seem to comprehend NSPORT (or just refuse to...) does not make it "contradictory" or make it "open to interpretation". No one seems to have trouble understanding WP:ARTN, on which premise the purpose of NSPORT rests. The guideline is very clear that it is intended to predict GNG coverage of a subject, and that inclusion is only merited if the subject satisfies GNG. An article on a subject in a discipline not covered by an SNG would have to have multiple pieces of SIGCOV in the article to protect it from being nominated for deletion, even if the subject does meet GNG but the sources are inaccessible. The second sentence of NSPORT states that the article on a sub-guideline-meeting subject doesn't have to immediately contain the SIGCOV sourcing that proves the subject meets GNG, it just has to include sourcing that proves it meets the criteria that predict GNG. At no point does it say meeting a sub-guideline is sufficient to merit an article without the subject meeting GNG; that's the whole point of "presuming GNG". JoelleJay (talk) 22:55, 6 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If NFOOTBALL (or NSPORT) doesn't override GNG, User:FormalDude, then why does NSPORT clearly say "Sports biographies must include at least one reference to a source providing significant coverage of the subject" - which if you were correct, and it didn't override GNG, not be there - as GNG requires multiple sources, while NSPORT only requires one. Nfitz (talk) 07:14, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Nfitz: Read the very next line. Meeting this requirement alone does not indicate notability, but it does indicate that there are likely sufficient sources to meet the GNG. I.e, it still needs to meet the GNG. ––FormalDude talk 09:04, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
For goodness sake there are articles on this website about rivers that contain no more than a sentence worth of information, there are articles for obscure musicians who were never anywhere near making a hit during their careers. The amount of articles on Olympians who didn't even medal is ridiculous - including people who competed in tournaments almost 100 years ago and are now long-deceased! Why can these articles be classed as 'notable' simply because they fall under a notable category, yet articles for footballers with ongoing careers as full professionals are being questioned?
There are a huge number of articles on Wikipedia which, by the logic above, should be removed. This would leave Wikipedia as nothing but a compilation of celebrity biographies, not an encyclopedia, as it is supposed to be. Davidlofgren1996 (talk) 17:23, 7 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Davidlofgren1996 If tens of thousands of footballer articles are anticipated to fail GNG, then they should also be taken to AfD. Notability is not inherent and WP:NOTINHERITED by affiliation with notable entities (like playing for a notable team), notability can be predicted through such an affiliation. That's what NSPORT subguidelines do: they do not confer notability, they presume the notability-granting SIGCOV required by GNG exists for subjects meeting their criteria (which are supposed to be calibrated to GNG). This presumption is rebuttable, so if a subject meeting NFOOTY is determined to NOT actually have GNG coverage, they should be deleted.
The amount of articles on Olympians who didn't even medal is ridiculous - including people who competed in tournaments almost 100 years ago and are now long-deceased! Why can these articles be classed as 'notable' simply because they fall under a notable category, yet articles for footballers with ongoing careers as full professionals are being questioned?
Yes, it is ridiculous, which is why the guideline was changed to not presume notability for non-medalists. Those biographies can and should be deleted, as should those on medallists who didn't receive SIGCOV.
There are a huge number of articles on Wikipedia which, by the logic above, should be removed. This would leave Wikipedia as nothing but a compilation of celebrity biographies, not an encyclopedia, as it is supposed to be.
The purpose of Wikipedia is WP:NOT to serve as a directory of athletes a la sports-reference.com. Actual directory websites are far, far better resources on current player stats (i.e. the only material provided by contemporary footballer wiki stubs) than Wikipedia is: they have paid employees automatically updating caps/transfers/etc. via advanced software programs, whereas Wikipedia relies on volunteers to manually update these parameters for tens of thousands of articles every day. There is no possibility of Wikipedia ever being up to date or complete under this system, so if the only info on these players can more accurately and easily be found on a dedicated database site there is zero point in wasting editor and reader time cultivating an incomplete, quickly-outdated collection of "biographies" of them. And are you suggesting it would be better to include not only celebrity biographies but biographies of people who aren't celebrities? You do realize every other broad encyclopedia has only a fraction of a percent of its biographies specifically on footballers? JoelleJay (talk) 21:48, 7 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@JoelleJay: Would it not be worth setting up a bot that automatically takes all stub articles to AfD, since I'm struggling to see how any stub article can meet GNG, if individual Wiki project guidelines for notability don't matter. Davidlofgren1996 (talk) 22:43, 7 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
And, to answer your question: yes, I do think it is better to include "non-celebrities". Do you know Yerko Ljubetic? How about Sharon Geary? Igor Tkachenko? Martin Fearon? Roberta Sá? I doubt it. I doubt 99.99% of any given population will. Yet there still exists articles about these people, as they are somewhat notable in their own rights. There is over 2 million stub articles on Wikipedia, and if we are to be hard-line about GNG, you're probably looking at getting rid of well over half of those. Wikiprojects help to determine whether someone is notable within their field, and there is a consensus at WP:NFOOTY that players with ongoing careers, especially ones who have made a significant number of appearances in fully professional football (hence this article's entire existence) will be given the benefit of the doubt in terms of AfDs. If you disagree with this, then, as I've suggested, I think it's about time we started tagging stub articles - we've got a lot of work to do! Davidlofgren1996 (talk) 23:05, 7 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
There is over 2 million stub articles on Wikipedia, and if we are to be hard-line about GNG, you're probably looking at getting rid of well over half of those. If over half of stub articles end up failing to meet notability guidelines, then yes those should also be deleted. No one is suggesting they shouldn't be. The AfD load does need to be manageable however, so a bot would quickly overwhelm the system.
Many, many editors disagree that the inclusion criteria developed by the football project accurately predict GNG, which is why so many athletes meeting NFOOTY are deleted... What members of individual sports projects have decided is "notable" does not supersede the actual notability guideline, which is NSPORT, and since that requires GNG all its subjects must meet it and the article must eventually include sources directly demonstrating this. JoelleJay (talk) 00:39, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
There is over 2 million stub articles on Wikipedia, and if we are to be hard-line about GNG, you're probably looking at getting rid of well over half of those. Haha god forbid we ever try to clean up Wikipedia and improve it! -Indy beetle (talk) 09:00, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I don’t know about you guys, but I think deleting 1/3 of the articles on the entire website would not improve it. Davidlofgren1996 (talk) 19:17, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I think if 1/3 of our articles are nonnotable stubs that’s a problem. -Indy beetle (talk) 16:29, 12 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
How, User:Alvaldi is the single claim above, over a month ago, that "attract more coverage in the future" CRYSTALBALL given that since then, he is no longer without a club, has been signed, and has made a fully-professional cap - generating more (routine) coverage? Can you expand on that? Nfitz (talk) 07:14, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Nfitz: He failed GNG a month ago so that any predictions that he will receive enough significant coverage in the future to pass GNG, due to still playing, are just that, predictions. As far as I know, he still hasn't received enough significant coverage to pass GNG. Making a fully-professional cap is irrelevant as NSPORTS states that all sport subjects must meet GNG, regardless of professional appearances. Look, GNG is not an impossible hurdle to overcome, three significant sources usually due the trick but in theory two could be enough. If anybody finds multiple significant sources on the subject, I am more than happy to change my !vote. Alvaldi (talk) 08:53, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Easily meets WP:NFOOTBALL. Nfitz (talk) 22:28, 11 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I already posted a closure request here a couple days ago. Maybe that's what caused the recent influx of delete votes. Avilich (talk) 14:35, 8 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't see anything in WP:N that depreciates WP:NFOOTBALL, User:Ravenswing. Are you claiming he doesn't meet NFOOTBALL by playing "in a competitive game between two teams from fully professional leagues"? Looks to me, that he not only meets by having one, he far exceed by having dozens! Nfitz (talk) 22:28, 11 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Nice try, Nfitz, but seeing that you're a participant in the footy's project's discussion of where to go from here [1], are you seriously going to claim that you're unaware of the RfC? Ravenswing 23:19, 11 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • There's a discussion - but the closure isn't complete, and the changes to NSPORT were reverted. There's no clear consensus, that's for sure. Nfitz (talk) 18:01, 12 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, gidonb (talk) 23:22, 12 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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