Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Zimbabwe women's national field hockey team at the 1980 Summer Olympics/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 Ian Rose 16:00, 9 April 2014 [1].

Zimbabwe women's national field hockey team at the 1980 Summer Olympics[edit]

Nominator(s): —Cliftonian (talk) 20:09, 14 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about what is probably the greatest ever Zimbabwean sports team—the women's hockey team at the 1980 Moscow Olympics, which despite being assembled less than a month before the Games won the gold medal without losing a match. Of course most of the best teams were not there because of the Western boycott, but the Zimbabwean victory was still a great shock. This is a really great, uplifting story that I thoroughly enjoyed researching. The team flew to Moscow on a plane without seats, usually used for carrying meat, and arrived without the right shoes to play on the artificial field. Pat McKillop, a Bulawayo housewife, scored six goals in five games to be the competition's joint top-scorer. Sally Mugabe promised each of the "Golden Girls" an ox each on their return home, but in the end they got polystyrene packages of meat instead. Whether or not this was a sardonic attempt at gallows humour is not recorded.

I feel this article meets the standards regarding prose, neutrality, sourcing, completeness and so forth and am therefore nominating it. I hope you enjoy reading it and look forward to your comments. —Cliftonian (talk) 20:09, 14 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Note: This is a WikiCup nomination. The following nominators are WikiCup participants: Cliftonian. To the nominator: if you do not intend to submit this article at the WikiCup, feel free to remove this notice. UcuchaBot (talk) 00:01, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments: A nice little article. Reads very nicely and looks to be comprehensive. An unusual story! Just a few minor comments from me. Sarastro1 (talk) 11:50, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • ”began to help fill the gaps the U.S.-led Olympic boycott”: Maybe it’s me, but the punctuation looks a bit off in “U.S.-led”; but it could well be the correct way to punctuate this.
  • We can easily get around it by just saying "American-led" instead. I have done this in the body too —Cliftonian (talk) 14:21, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • ”Zimbabwe's subsequent undefeated victory in the round-robin tournament with three wins and two draws was widely regarded as a huge upset”: I understand the meaning here, but “undefeated victory” sounds a little silly; I think just “Zimbabwe's subsequent victory in the round-robin tournament with three wins and two draws was [widely - do we need this?] regarded as a huge upset”
  • ”the gold medal was the country's first of any colour at the Olympics.”: Perhaps “the country’s first Olympic medal of any colour”?
  • ”it had been excluded from the 1968, 1972 and 1976 Games for political reasons.”: Could we say briefly what those political reasons were; mainly for anyone who doesn’t know the story and is too lazy to check.
  • OK, have added "following the mostly white government's declaration of independence from Britain in 1965". I think going into the specifics of the issue regarding sport would be too complicated to deal with here. The Rhodesian sports teams were, unlike South Africa's, multiracial; the point at hand at least from Britain's point of view was that Rhodesia was in their view illegitimate after UDI in 1965. There was rather ironically a period when the British considered it more acceptable for teams to tour South Africa than Rhodesia, even though the former had apartheid and the latter didn't. There's plenty more details in the article linked to in the article. —Cliftonian (talk) 14:21, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • ”whose brother was international cricketer Duncan Fletcher.”: I think this is better as “the international cricketer”
  • ”Two points would be awarded for a win and one for a draw; the team with the most points at the end would be the winner.”: I wonder if this would be better as “Two points were awarded…”?
  • ”All of the matches were played at Dynamo Minor Arena”: For me, this should be “all the matches” but I’m not too sure how this stands grammatically.
  • I'm not sure about this one, so I will leave it for now, but if other reviewers think it is okay we can revisit it. —Cliftonian (talk) 14:21, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • ”Zimbabwe were one of the teams in the first ever women's Olympic hockey match, playing against Poland on 25 July.”: Maybe this would be better as “Zimbabwe played in the first women’s Olympic hockey match, facing Poland on 25 July”?
  • ”scored the first goal in women's Olympic hockey”: Given the previous sentence, I don’t think we need to say “in women’s Olympic hockey”; this is clearly implied.
  • ”with McKillop and Chase scoring”: Better to avoid “with [noun] [verb]ing”
  • ”right-half”: Do we have a link for this position?
  • ”it has been called a "fairytale"[3] and an "irresistible fairy story”.”: Called by who? Sarastro1 (talk) 11:50, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've put "sports historians have called it a "fairytale" and an "irresistible fairy story"". We can redraw to put the names of the people if you like but I feel this would be a little clunky myself. —Cliftonian (talk) 14:21, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much for the review, Sarastro—I hope my replies above are to your satisfaction. Keep well and have a great weekend. —Cliftonian (talk) 14:21, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Support: Changes looking good; I think this article comfortably meets the criteria. As usual, an excellent piece of work. Sarastro1 (talk) 19:57, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much for the review, the support and the kind words; very much appreciated —Cliftonian (talk) 20:22, 15 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]


Support Leaning to support – An enjoyable article, which it will be is a pleasure to support. Just four comments, though one of them is rather fundamental:

  • I wondered what on earth "field hockey" was till I read on. It seems, on further enquiry, to be a North Americanism to distinguish hockey from ice-hockey. To an English reader it seems a long-winded way of saying "hockey". We have been calling it "hockey" since at least 1527, and as, to judge from the Harare Herald clipping you link to, the Zimbabweans call it "hockey" rather than "field hockey" I think you ought to as well, in both the title and the text.
  • You are correct. I call it hockey myself (as did all the players, so far as I know), and I did use the simpler term "hockey" in many places in the article, but I think referring to "field hockey" in the first instance in the article is important to avoid ambiguity—not all readers will be Zimbabweans, Brits, et al.—and also because that was (and is) the official name of the Olympic event. I understand this objection and sympathise somewhat with your view but I think in the circumstances we should keep the title as it is. It is just one extra word and in the prose itself almost every usage has "hockey" rather than "field hockey". —Cliftonian (talk) 18:18, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Grudging and grumbling acquiescence. Another triumph for Uncle Sam over the Queen's English! Tim riley (talk) 18:28, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • I am rather split myself on this one but I cannot help but think changing this to bring it out of step with all the other relevant articles would be a losing battle from a start. —Cliftonian (talk) 18:58, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • The Oxford English Dictionary hyphenates "vice captain", and so would I.
  • "massive underdogs" – I don't think the condition of being an underdog is governed by size. If you need to qualify the noun (which I'm not sure you do) perhaps "serious" or another adjective might be nearer the mark.
  • Thanks for this. I have gone with "serious"; I think it is important to make clear that they did not expect to even come close to winning. —Cliftonian (talk) 18:18, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • "both of Zimbabwe's victories" – is the "of" wanted?
  • Taking it out certainly tightens the sentence up. Cheers! —Cliftonian (talk) 18:18, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Other than that, nothing but approval. – Tim riley (talk) 16:27, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Thank you very much for the kind words and the review, Tim—as always very much appreciated. I'm glad you enjoyed the article and I hope my replies above are to your satisfaction. Have a great rest of the week —Cliftonian (talk) 18:18, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Support now added. A pleasure to read, nobody killed, and the article clearly meets the FAC criteria in my opinion. Tim riley (talk) 18:28, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Support with a few suggestions:

  • I'm a bit bothered by the redlinks in the lead, which stand out rather. I know they are potential links to as-yet unborn articles on those countries' field hockey teams; I'm prepared to bet that in the normal run of events they will remain unborn for the foreseeable future. The best solution would be for you to create stub articles for these hockey teams. The links would then turn blue alongside those for India and the USSR, and readers less cogniscent with WP practices would not have to wonder why these countries were represented in bright red.
  • I've run up stubs for all of these, agree this is a big improvement. —Cliftonian (talk) 17:50, 19 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • "which had just become an internationally recognised country in April 1980" - with the date given, "just" is redundant
  • "just 35 days before the Olympics were due to start" – another unnecessary "just"
  • I think "manager" rather than "manageress"
  • "Manageress" was the term used in the source, but I see no harm in changing to the more orthodox term —Cliftonian (talk) 17:50, 19 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Is there any reason why only Arlene Boxhall lacks a stub article and therefore alone is a redlink? Is a stub possible?
  • The stubs for all the players already existed and were so far as I can tell created en masseusing an internet source that only seems to list those who actually played as opposed to the whole squad. Boxhall never came off the bench so doesn't seem to have been counted. Anyway I've fixed this now; she now has an article too. —Cliftonian (talk) 17:50, 19 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Watch for unnecessary emphasis via adverbs, e.g. "totally by surprise", "entirely unrelated to sport"
  • I've taken out "entirely" (an improvement), but I kept "totally" as I think taking it out makes the prose worse. I hope this is OK with you. —Cliftonian (talk) 17:50, 19 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • "With 50 minutes on the clock..." Non-hockey players such as myself won't understand the significance of "50 minutes on the clock", unless we are told somewhere the duration of a match, e.g. "With 50 minutes of the match's 70 minutes gone..." (if indeed 70 minutes is the duration)
  • "the joint-fifth most in the event" – I am not entirely convinced of the notability of this nugget of information!
  • I thought it was worth mentioning that Chase was still one of the top scorers in the event despite being injured, but perhaps you're right that just mentioning that she played and scored some goals is enough. —Cliftonian (talk) 17:50, 19 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Otherwise, an interesting piece of Olympic history of which I had no previous knowledge at all. Well done. Brianboulton (talk) 22:01, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much for the review, the kind words and the support, Brian. I hope my replies above are to your satisfaction. I'm glad you seem to have enjoyed reading this. Cheers again —Cliftonian (talk) 17:50, 19 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note -- just a prompt that we'll need source and image reviews (unless I missed 'em)... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 09:38, 28 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Images are okay: Two CC images donated by the RIA Novosti (I need to buy a beer for whoever negotiated that!) and one free image (crop by a Wikipedian of a PD US Mil work; source is still online and accessible; would be nice to have better quality but I can't see it happening). Captions needed periods (all are full sentences) but I've done that. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:58, 28 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments - You've done a great job with this article! I have a few concerns listed below, but they shouldn't take long to address.

  1. The meaning of "built around the former Rhodesia team" should be clarified.
I'm sorry to quibble, but I don't see what isn't clear about this? —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I have no idea what this phrase means. Is "built around" a metaphor? If so, for what? And what former Rhodesia team? The article says that Rhodesia had been excluded from the Olympics for years, so my understanding is that there hadn't been any Rhodesia teams for ages. Neelix (talk) 20:23, 5 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
There was always a Rhodesia team that played against the South African provinces within South Africa's domestic system. (Before 1980 this system was common to many of the sports popular in southern Africa, prominently cricket and rugby; a parallel can be seen in English first-class cricket where to this day the English and Welsh counties play against teams representing the whole of Scotland and Ireland). The 1980 Games were the first to feature hockey so Rhodesia's exclusion from 1968, '72 and '76 isn't relevant here. "Built around" means the team was based around the core of the Rhodesia team but wasn't quite the same. I have expanded to "built around the core of the former Rhodesia team"; is this better? —Cliftonian (talk) 16:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  1. Semicolons are overused in this article. In particular, they should be removed from the second paragraph in the "Invitation and team selection" section, the second paragraph of the "Tournament" section, and the first paragraph of the "Reactions and legacy" section.
I've cut down on semicolons; is this better do you think? —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
It's looking good now; I removed one more myself. Neelix (talk) 20:24, 5 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Great. —Cliftonian (talk) 16:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  1. I think "all of these teams had been eliminated" should read "all of the other teams had been eliminated".
No, because we say before "apart from the Soviets". In Commonwealth English at least, you wouldn't say "apart from X, all of the other Y". —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that the sentence is technically grammatically correct, but is confusing because the phrase "eliminated in qualifying" could refer both to the teams that competed and the teams that did not; the former group was disqualified and then qualified, while the latter group was qualified and then disqualified. Another solution would be to phrase the sentence as follows: "apart from the Soviets, none of these teams had initially qualified for the Olympics, and they were only allowed to compete because of the spaces that had opened up as a result of the boycott." Neelix (talk) 20:36, 5 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
How about "apart from the Soviets, all of these teams were competing as a result of the boycott, having failed to qualify initially"? —Cliftonian (talk) 16:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  1. The phrase "white and blue outfit" should read "white-and-blue outfit".
OK —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  1. The phrase "according to Byrom" should be offset with commas.
OK —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  1. What is a "right-half" and a "through pass"?
I've put a wikilink for right-half and a link to wiktionary for through pass. Right half basically means right midfield and a through pass (more commonly through ball) is a pass forward, between opposing defenders, which a team-mate then runs on to. —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  1. The meanings of the abbreviations in the "Final standings" table should be elucidated.
I've put tooltips in that appear when you hover over the letters. Are these good? —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  1. I recommend removing the quotation "Nobody who shared the joy of the players and officials could deny them their moment of glory" considering the lengthier quotation from the same commentator that follows immediately afterwards.
I'd really rather keep it (it's all the same quotation). —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
My concern is that we're giving Harris's comments far more weight than those of other commentators such as Sullivan. That is true already by concluding the entire article with Harris's thoughts, but juxtaposing a single word of a quotation from Sullivan with two entire sentences of a quotation from Harris seems to me to be excessive, especially considering that the article indicates that the quotation by Sullivan is representative of the comments by other commentators as well. Neelix (talk) 20:44, 5 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I've cut it down a bit. What do you think now? —Cliftonian (talk) 16:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Very interesting article! Neelix (talk) 17:16, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for this David, really very much appreciated. I hope I have satisfactorily addressed your concerns. —Cliftonian (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for considering my thoughts on the article. I have struck through the concerns that you have addressed. Neelix (talk) 20:47, 5 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Neelix. I hope I have fixed all the problems now. —Cliftonian (talk) 16:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Source review: Sources and formatting look good, and no problems. Just one little issue:

  • The Mathers article in the bibliography has a stray full stop before "in".

Otherwise fine as far as I can tell. Sarastro1 (talk) 20:56, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Sarastro. I can't seem to find a way to format this reference without the full stop while keeping the link from the footnote working (the full stop is part of the citation template). Do you think we could possibly let this slide? I'm sorry about this. Thanks again for the source review. —Cliftonian (talk) 14:26, 5 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I had a stab at fixing it using a slightly different format. Is that OK? If not, maybe just capitalise "in" to avoid any problems. Either way, sources good now. Sarastro1 (talk) 21:19, 5 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Picture review: All pictures are well-described, free of copyright and appropriate. I'd personally recommend that File:Sally Hayfron.jpg is reverted to the previous version which is probably less blocky, and ideally replaced with another image in the future, but obviously this does not in any way condition me against support. Per WP:ImageSize, all images should be left as default 220px and not forced, but this seems universally ignored anyway and I wouldn't make too much of this. Just one thing - I believe Wikiprotocol dictates that punctuation (or at any rate full-stops) should be removed from captions...
In any case, an excellent article, and from the perspective of the pictures, I have no trouble supporting promotion. Brigade Piron (talk) 09:01, 6 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much Sarastro and Brigade Piron. —Cliftonian (talk) 16:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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