Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Ernie Toshack

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 00:06, 27 March 2008.

[edit] Ernie Toshack

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I'm nominating this article for featured article because... ermm I think it is a comprehensive account, properly sourced of one of the spearheads of Don Bradman's Invincibles. Relative to my other articles, this is relatively short, because he only played first-class cricket for about 3 years; he started late because of WW2 and then had a knee injury. Part of the attempt to make a featured topic. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 07:59, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Comment.It's well illustrated, too.Phanto282 (talk) 11:39, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Oppose - the article needs more references and some tables with his records about his matches etc. Support - thanks some recent edits, the article is so subdisfactory. MOJSKA 666 (msg) 12:19, 14 March 2008 (UTC) 12:20, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
Not actionable; examples are needed of statements that need citation. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:00, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
Breakdown against individual countries given, as are alternative sources and obits. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 02:20, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
If you mean on the sources, those sources are stats cards with no dates of publication indicated, so they aren't there. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 02:23, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
I was referring to Mojska's original oppose rationale. I didn't understand what he meant by date labels. Nishkid64 (Make articles, not love) 17:56, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comments
    • Linkie tool is showing that the Obituary needs registration.Everything else shows fine for the little tool
Everything else on the sources checks out great. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:19, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comments - nice article, some suggestions (with my cricket hat off)
    • "new ball attack" - a bit too jargony for the lead.
    • "and had his early cricket career hindered due to the economic difficulties of the Great Depression" how? I had to read ahead to find out he suffered a ruptured appendix, but was the ruptured appendix a result of the Great Depression? A bit confused.
Hmm, the source means a lack of money meant that he had less time to train I think, although it is not clear. It didn't mean the illness. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 05:07, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
    • Test cricket is linked to twice in the lead but first class isn't.
    • Any chance of expanding how he came to be orphaned?
None of the sources give his parents' cause of death. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 05:07, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
    • "fastish" - I don't think so! Perhaps medium-fast?
    • "1944-45" - en dash required.
    • "first-class" or "first class"?
    • Any chance of linking out to bowling averages?
    • " wicket-taking list." which list? Context needed.
    • Two "back injury" sentences in the Invincibles section reads awkwardly.
    • Ref 1 seems to have a spare pair of closing braces.
  • That's all I can see right now. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:25, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Apart from that, everything else has been (hopefully) attended to. I also linked batting average and a whole pile of other cricket jargon. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 05:07, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comments
    • What influence did his bowling have on future Australian bowlers like Thomson, Lillee and McGrath? Who were Toshack's own influences? I think it's important to put his contributions into context, especially given the number of great fast bowlers that Australia has produced over the years.
    • I also think the article ends rather abruptly. There's a substantial discussion of life after cricket in the Don Bradman article. The article says that Toshack spent 25 years as a foreman and supervisor on construction sites...was he not involved in cricket (as an administrator, coach, etc) after retirement? AreJay (talk) 23:06, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
It is important to put his contributions into context, but in this case, as the sources quote Bradman, his style of bowling was rather unusual and did not have any similar precedents or imitators after. He is compared to the prolific English fastish spinner Derek Underwood explicitly. There was no speed gun in those days, but he would have been somewhere around 110-120 kph from the qualitative description. With regards to Thomson and Lillee, they were express fast bowlers who bowled conventionally, outside off stump, usually with a 6-3 field whereas Toshack bowled with a 4-5 legside field. McGrath was also the same although he was moderately fast. The other thing was that Toshack bowled left arm over the wicket at their pads, and in his era the pitches were not covered and Toshack was famous for bowling on sticky pitches as discussed in the article; since the mid 1950s, pitches have been covered during rain, so nobody after the the mid 1950s played under Toshack's conditions. The only Australian left arm pace bowlers who played after Toshack but before the 1960s were Bill Johnston (cricketer) and Alan Davidson (cricketer) but they were fast bowlers, and bowled to a conventional off side field, not leg theory. None of the sources compare him to earlier bowlers, so it would be OR for me to do so. Looking at the List of Australian Test cricketers and the players in the 50 years preceding him, there were no other left arm fast spin/slow medium pace type bowlers except Charlie Macartney (also an FA). However, Macartney did not bowl at leg stump with a leg side field. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 05:07, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
I was unable to find more info on his after cricket activities, except that he also wrote a bit about cricket and enjoyed gardening. I looked up a book of the New South Wales Cricket Association and did not see him in the list of board members or state level coaches, so it would be rather ungainly to put in a few sentences "He did not do this...he did not do that". Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 05:07, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Support per my GA review on Talk:Ernie Toshack. Daniel (talk) 06:15, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment late to the party (sorry). I'm working my way through this now, but as a generality, while his cricket playing life clearly should be the core of the article, the post-cricket years are too quickly dismissed. I appreciate it's probably hard to find out more about his life and interests after playing, but I'm sure the comments about his writing could be expanded? --Dweller (talk) 13:14, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
The SMH obit from which I got the writing about cricket is all that I can find, Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 06:02, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
I ccan't see any books by him in the State Libary either. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 06:03, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Support I also tried finding writing info, without luck. --Dweller (talk) 16:15, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Support. Seems sufficient enough to be an FA for me; also I think that there are enough refs. Perhaps they could be reorganized into {{reflist|2}}. Interesting article as well. Khoikhoi 00:16, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Support - happy with this now, good stuff Blnguyen and co... The Rambling Man (talk) 12:18, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Notes:
  • Jargon, what is this 11/31 ? ... He took career-best match figures of 11/31 in the First Test ... 11 out of 31 ? I see these slashes throughout, and I don't know what they are. Is that like a baseball average? Are they explained somewhere? (Never seen a cricket match in my life, sorry :-)
  • Thanks, Mattinbgn; that will help, although I can't say that the Bowling analysis makes any of it clear or understandable :/ Perhaps this is how others feel when reading American football or baseball articles? I'll try to learn the sport so I can understand these FACs, but both cricket bios at FAC right now have lost me. Maybe it's just me. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:08, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Is Tests supposed to be in upper case here? ... who played in 12 Tests from ... and here ? First-class and Test debut
  • More lingo here, what are "third grade" and "first grade"? Is that like AAA and AA ball in baseball? ... starting in third grade in 1944–45.[4] Within two matches, he rose to first grade. ...
*Yeah, third grade is the third tier of competition. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 07:20, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
  • More lingo, this is the first time I encounter the word "wicket" in the article, no idea what this phrase means or what a "wicket" is ... sorry :-) ... and was quickly among the wickets. Can you cricket experts run through the article one more time and make it easier on someone like me who has no idea of cricket (wikilinks or explanations)?
  • should non Test have a hyphen here ? And number consistency ? ... only six of the 29 non Test matches on the tour ...
  • Conversion, we need cm here: ... Standing 6 ft 2 in, he ...

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:00, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Cricket followers delight in using the word wicket in many senses, including "sticky wicket" in this article, but it could be clarified better. Presumably the first time a short bowling statistic is used it should say "11 wickets for 31 runs (11/31)" or "11 wickets (out of a possible 20) for 31 runs (11/31)".--Grahame (talk) 01:50, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
Okey doke. Linked to the cases of a dismissal and linked the sticky wicket explicitly. I also changed wet wicket etc to sticky, since otherwise, people would not understand and sticky is already used directly. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 07:20, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose and please don't shoot the messenger. Many readers, and not only those in non-cricket playing countries, will have problems understanding this article and Toshack's achievements. The problem lies mainly in the First-class and Test debut and Invincibles tour sections —with all that jargon. Although not entirely avoidable, no effort has been made to accommodate readers not used to the terminology. The words won and win are used only once and lost not at all. Wicket subtley changes its meaning as in and was quickly among the wickets and his only ten wicket match haul, (which is also bad grammar) and sticky wicket. Given that most of the important scores are in the statistics box, these sections could be improved by spelling-out the bowling result the first time one is used and explaning its significance. And, (I know this requires skill), avoiding using so many. There are some odd phrases in the article.

**He took career-best match bowling figures of 11/31 in the First Test from the Lead. This needs a possessive or indefinate article.

    • the club for which he was residentially zoned" does this mean local?
    • He performed consistently without taking large innings hauls
    • Toshack collected his only ten wicket match haul in Tests
    • He removed both and ended with 5/2 in 19 balls the removed is bad.
    • When he was available this is redundant.
    • He had a moderate Third Test does this mean moderately successful?

These are just some examples, there are more which makes the style of the prose difficult to follow. The Article seems to finish half way through; what about the writing career we read about in the Lead and what did he build? What did he do during his long retirement? Lastly, Ashes should be wiki-linked. Forgive me and don't shoot me.--GrahamColmTalk 20:52, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

For the part about writing, we found nothing in all the libraries of Australia, so it appears he didn't write any books, we do not know anymore than what is in the obit. No full book biography was written about Toshack, so we are in a tight spot. As for not using lost, during Toshack's period, Australia did not lose a single match. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 07:20, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
I've changed it so that all the notations are put in word form with links the first time, and then with the numbers in brackets. I think I have tweaked your wroding requests. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:16, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Comment There is not much info on Toshack post-cricket because he severed his connection with the game, so much so that when he attended an Invincibles reunion for the first time, in the 1990s, he had to be re-introduced to some of his erstwhile teammates. Phanto282 (talk) 13:40, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Changing to Neutral. I have made a few changes, please revert them if they are not improvements.[1]. The quality of the prose prevents me from supporting. (See the opening sentence of the Style section for example). This isn't grammatically incorrect but, for me at least, it ruins the flow.--GrahamColmTalk 14:50, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.