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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Sam Loxton/archive1

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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 by Karanacs 21:39, 12 February 2010 [1].

Sam Loxton

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Nominator(s): YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 07:35, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
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This fellow was notable for being an Australian Test crickeer from 1948 to 1951, yes he was in the Invincibles, he also played top-flight Australian rules football and was a politician for the Liberal Party of Australia for 24 years. He served as a cricket administrator for two decades, overseeing the Australian tour of Pakistan and India in 1959-60, which was successful. Since then, Australia have only won one Test in Pakistan and two series in India YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 07:35, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Are we looking at the same article? No "Later life" section here, and three paragraphs on Loxton's political career in the "Off the field" section. Not being an Australian I can't judge whether his political career was particularly notable, but it is as a cricketer, not as a politician, that he is most widely known. You wouldn't expect to find extensive stuff in the Bradman article about his career as a stockbroker, would you? Brianboulton (talk) 10:12, 21 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I just went on Google News and did a search for him between 1954 and 1980, one year before the start and after the end of his career. There were around 190 hits, and less than 10% of these are about his politics. The other 90% was about the latter stages of his playing career (as he still played while an MP) or his work as a cricket administrator during the same time. According to MS Word's word count, 2300 characters in the main body are about politics, out of a total of 14,573 in the total characters for 1954-80, so the political coverage is punching above its weight already (15%). It only adds another two sentences to what is already there: that he was the youngest MP when he was first elected, and that they let him make the first speech of the parliament, and that he had a strong personal following at then when he retired his party lost lots of votes and the seat. It also said that he was "low key" representative; he was a backbencher, out of around 40 Liberals in Parliament, and he was also away for about three months of the year still playing cricket, managing the team (4 months in India), watching the players and selecting them so it's not surprising that he wasn't driving the political scene in Victoria. YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 02:41, 22 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Still waiting for Rebecca to reply YellowMonkey(bananabucket) 08:03, 26 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
From her user page it seems as though Rebecca has left the project. Brianboulton (talk) 10:01, 26 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
She hasn't updated her userpage since coming out of retirement, which was a while ago, and voted in another FAC just now YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 23:53, 26 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I consider the the section relating to Loxton's parliamentary term to be more than adequate. Loxton was never a prominent MP and more detail could be seen as undue weight. If members of WP:AUSPOL wish to write it, a spin out article about his obscure backbench career could be developed. Just another point, use of the term "primary vote" is likely to be confusing to US readers, given the US system of primary elections. -- Mattinbgn\talk 08:44, 22 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Done YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 00:56, 25 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Done YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 00:56, 25 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments – Read through the 1948 England Tour:

  • "kicking a total of 114 goals before his retirement at end of the 1946 season to concentrate on his cricket career." Add another "the" after "at"? (Not sure if other prose reviewers would consider the change wordiness or not)
  • Early and war years: "at Wesley College, Melbourne, and elite private boys' school." "and" has one letter too many.
  • "First-class and Test cricket: Should "a" be inserted into "before going off to hospital with concussion"? I'm not familiar with British English that much, so I don't know if you would put it before "concussion" or not. Might as well ask about it.
  • Invincibles tour: "Loxton's attempts to break into the first-choice team was hampered by a groin strain he suffered...". "was" → "were".
  • "before scraping home without further loss after Yorkshire dropped both batsmend." Should the last letter be there? My lack of cricket knowledge strikes again.
  • Italics for Wisden Cricketers' Almanack? Giants2008 (27 and counting) 00:36, 27 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Changing all except hospital. In things like going to work/school/university, the definite article isn't needed YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 00:57, 27 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: — Why aren't some single digit numbers spelt out? Aaroncrick (talk) 01:19, 27 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There's a rule that when you have a group of numbers together, they are all spelt out or numbered, so "3 and 43" not "three and 43", as "three and forty-three" would be mroe of a hassle YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 01:41, 27 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Source comments Everything fine. RB88 (T) 13:34, 30 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Note for the record: There are no images in this article, so no image review is necessary. There is a single graph, which is obviously user-created and appropriately licensed. Karanacs (talk) 18:02, 2 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support – My comments above were all addressed, and I went through the rest, tweaking a few other things. Yet another well-written, well-referenced cricket article. And yes, I think the section on his political career is adequate. Giants2008 (27 and counting) 01:39, 3 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Leaning to waffling to support Most of issues (below) are all addressed sufficiently. Auntieruth55 (talk) 18:07, 9 February 2010 (UTC) This article is stunning...in a lot of ways. I'm concerned about (1) Jargon; (2) loaded lead; (3) did I mention jargon? and (4) some awkwardness of the wording.[reply]
examples (just from the lead)
awkwardness
he reached his greatest heights on the cricket field....heights? perhaps his greatest achievements? greatest acclaim?
a further seven seasons before... seven more seasons
jargon
right-handed all-rounder
belligerent middle-order batsman.... is belligerent good? Usually it isn't.
I understand that since I know next to nothing about Aussie footie, or any kind of cricket, much of this sounds like jargon, but I suspect that a lot of it is. In particular, I found the lead nearly inaccessible. It is also really long, and perhaps has more detail than it needs. While I appreciate the editors' enthusiasm for the subject, perhaps less is more, in this case. I could not distinguish the most important achievements from the mere achievements. I gather this guy was the cricket and footie equivalent of Michael Jordan and John Elway. Multiple sport players, and good at nearly everything.
I've linked the jargon in the lead. I forgot to link the lead and only did the body before that. At the time Australian rules football was only played in southern Australia, and they didn't have a national league, he played in a state league. In the old days there were many elite multi-sportspeople. That should take care of it as I can't explain the rules of cricket in the article YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 06:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
okay, but that is interesting about him, and something I didn't know about the old days, and elite players. And it is a way to place him in specific context, and highlight his skills. Auntieruth55 (talk) 19:19, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Jargon is still a major issue here, not just having links, but because it makes the reading extremely difficult.
verb problems, and general prose issues
The younger Sam started his education at Yarra Park State School, where he learned to bat while a pine tree in the yard served as the stumps; the tree was used for the same purpose years earlier by Test players Vernon Ransford and Ernie McCormick, and long-serving Victorian player Jack Ledward
Sam Jr. (parallel to Sam Sr.)
learned to bat using a pine tree in the yard as the stumps; the tree had been used for the same purpose years earlier by Test players...
question, the same tree? is the yard at the school? or at his home? or somewhere else? By yard, do you mean playground (school yard), or garden?
since there is no article for Collingwood Cricket Club, perhaps at this point, write it out?
the family then moved to Armadale, and young Loxton attended Armadale Public School before completing his secondary education at Wesley College, Melbourne,
then? perhaps in XXXX, or just, the family moved..
The boys’ school coach was P. L. Williams, a renowned mentor of teenagers. Williams had earlier coached Ross Gregory and future Test captain Lindsay Hassett
The boys's school coach, P.L. Williams, a renowned mentor of teenagers, had earlier coached Ross Gregory and future Test captain Lindsay...
cucumber sandwiches? the staple of cricket teams? is this like pizza for Little Leaguers?
Loxton was a kid during the Great Depression, and during and after WWII the economic situation was not great. At first-class and international matches there were anecdotes of the official lunchh catering being purely salads and a slice of ham. I don't think diverging to explain the food rationing is needed here with respect to Mrs Loxton's offerings YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 06:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
now, that, I think should be (or could be) added, because it helps to place it in context. Auntieruth55 (talk) 19:19, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
So it seems to me that the article needs just another run through with a copy editing pencil -- perhaps Ian can do that, or YM, but there are enough awkward points and clause confusion, modifiers, and participle problems that it probably could use another pair of knowledgeable eyes, if we are to say that this is some of WP's best writing. That said, I like the enthusiasm of the article, which is why I'm Leaning toward Waffling Support Auntieruth55 (talk) 18:46, 8 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I'll continue with this YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 06:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Someone knowledgeable has arrived (see DCGeist's comments below). I'm still waffling on this, in particular regarding the jargon, which makes largely incomprehensible to readers who are not cricket aficionados or even those who may be moderately informed re cricket. When I consider past FACs of, for example Werner Mölders, the use of words/phrases such as "kills", or he claimed 5 kills, or "air ace", "ace", or "ace in a day" were flagged as jargon, and the editor was required to explain them and even linking was insufficient. While I found it annoying, in the end it resulted in a better article. Although I appreciate that you may not want to provide a cricket lesson, at least the lead should be relatively intelligible (and shorter) to the average reader, and quite honestly, the average reader isn't going to be a cricket expert. I do appreciate the obvious enthusiasm for the man and his game!
  • I'm reasonably confident that once DCG's comments are addressed, this will have improved sufficiently in terms of lead, jargon, style, and understandability to be supported. Auntieruth55 (talk) 18:57, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Explained the meat stuff. Just as an aside, in England in 1948, apparently the sausages had other stuff mixed into them, as there was a lack of meat. Added a few more words to the lead to explain a bit more jargon, I can't do anymore unless a whole sentence is devotged to explaining what these techniques are, which would be inappropriate YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 07:48, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Comments:
    • Being Australian I guess I don't notice any jargon as much as others might, so I'm probably not the best person to effect a copyedit for that. What I have done is gone through about half the article to reduce a tendency to use the guy's name in every second sentence. YM, if you could go through the rest yourself in a similar vein it'd be a good idea.
    • Aside from that the general prose looks good to me, as with the referencing. Pity about no images... When I searched for "Sam Loxton" at Picture Australia I found a portrait from 1947, which is therefore PD-Australia but not PD-1996. However I wonder whether you couldn't ask the National Archives for a release under GNU; I did it once for a military pic and they agreed to at least say they considered it public domain world-wide, which was good enough for OTRS. Failing that, you might have a case for fair use, since you have no other images of him at all. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 00:22, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've emailed them, hopefully it comes eventually although I don't consider a portrait to be critical except to show his face, which doesn't add to the understnading much. I've switched the words around by referring to him by various other things, as I didn't want to use he over and over YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 06:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't withhold support because there's no image, but it's good to have if possible. Tks for finishing off the work substituting for the name recurrences. Well done, as usual. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 07:11, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: Obviously a very comprehensive, thoughtfully researched article. I'll read through the whole thing, but will start with four small points concerning the lede and the Style section, which always interests me:

  • In the first paragraph, Loxton is described as an "aggressive" cricketer. In the next sentence, we learn that "he was known above all for his physically vigorous style of play". At the end of the paragraph we are told that as a cricketer (as well as a footballer and politician), "he was known for his energetic approach". This is perhaps too much. I'd say one of the first two bits of color should be cut—probably "aggressive", as the adjective appears again in the lede, two grafs down. (Or you could modify the last sentence so it is not again describing his approach to cricket.)
  • Same paragraph: The Invincibles "went through the 1948 tour of England undefeated, an unprecedented feat". Awkward echo of "feat" there. Perhaps "unprecedented accomplishment".
Done these bits and bobs YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 07:48, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lede, last graf: he was a Victoria legislator "for 24 years from 1955 to 1979". Surely our readers can do simple maths. Is "for 24 years" necessary? (Or, of course, you could restructure thus: "Loxton entered politics and was elected in 1955 to the Victorian Legislative Assembly, where he represented the Liberal Party for 24 years.")
  • Actually, is this "represented" bit proper idiom? Isn't a legislator said to represent his constituency (Prahran, in this case), rather than his party? I just realized, as well, that 24 years is already stated in the first graf, making its inclusion here entirely unnecessary.—DCGeist (talk) 02:52, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
De jure yes, although most people would say the party, but I changed it anyway YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 07:48, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Style: We are given a superb picture of his bowling. The image of his batting is less clear, which I'm sure is down to the sources. Still, is there any observation or quotation that might be added to the fact that "he had a penchant for trying to hook bouncers out of the ground"? Was there any other specific stroke that he favored or was particularly proficient at? Was he generally regarded as a stronger on- or off-side batsman? Was his running between the wickets as aggressive as the rest of his game? If there's anything available, I think it would help round things out.
I found a snippet saying that he liked to retreat onto the back foot, and added that. So he probably, cuts pulls and hooks a lot. I didn't find anything more on his style, unfortunately. With Australian players I hardly ever find anything written about running between wickets, as generally they find this very easy, so perhaps the writers don't bother to discuss unless the person is a poor runner, unlike eg Indian or Pakistani players who tend to be very poor between the wickets. I can add a comment that he did loft the ball to the on-side a lot in his most famous innings, but can't find anything that says he likes hitting there most of the time YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 07:48, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I look forward to reading the rest of the article.—DCGeist (talk) 06:54, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What dab? YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 02:44, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
this disambiguation page: Loxton Auntieruth55 (talk) 15:37, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Done YellowMonkey (vote in the Southern Stars photo poll) 03:48, 12 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment "Despite previous assurances to prepare turf pitches, the locals made a matting surface for the First Test. When asked by General Ayub Khan—head of the ruling military junta—why Pakistan had not been invited to Australia, Loxton exploited the opportunity to complain about the wickets. Ayub then threatened to shoot the groundsmen if they prepared any more matting surfaces, and Australia were greeted with turf pitches as promised from thereon in"
I'll just chop the last part, as this might be an error, as the Peter English article that I just cited said the 1st and 3rd were mats YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 08:02, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Checked the book again. My mistake YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 23:31, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed YellowMonkey (vote in the Southern Stars photo poll) 03:48, 12 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Another mishap occurred during the Fifth Test at Eden Gardens in Calcutta; the Australians left their hotel and took to the field with ten men, having failed to notice that Ian Meckiff had overslept and been left behind by the team bus"

  • Again, I didn't know this story, but would think it pretty tough for Meckiff to open the bowling with Davidson if it had happened exactly the way it is said in the article. In Ayub Khan story and other stories about the 1959-60 series, there seems to be a conscious attempt from the original author (Haigh ?) to aggrandize the part played by Loxton. Tintin 07:50, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Well Haigh's book got a lot of rave reviews, that one in particular, and the thing abou Meckiff oversleeping quoted Meckiff himself. As for Haigh, well he is a leading, mainstream cricket historian, his minority anti-T20 opinions that seem to peeve Indians notwithstanding YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 08:02, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Also, Australia bowled first thing in the morning on many days, this incident isn't a contradiction unless he overslept on the first day. YellowMonkey (Southern Stars photo poll) 08:06, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]


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