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 keep. (non-admin closure) CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 01:49, 4 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Will Davidson[edit]

Will Davidson (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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This article does not follow WP:BIO because there are no sources other than this single manchester united listing of former players, which shows that he played for two years in the 1890s. There are no other sources on google etc. showing this person was significant in any way. -William (talk) 01:17, 21 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (✉) 01:58, 21 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Football-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (✉) 01:58, 21 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Scotland-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (✉) 01:58, 21 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak delete because biographies need to be sourced. LBHS Cheerleader (talk) 02:54, 21 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - article is sourced. Source shows 40+ appearances for Manchester United. A quick check of one of his match dates in the newspapers of the time show him in the planned line-up (this is the September 9, 1893) edition of the Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser on page 11 under Football - Fixtures For To-Day. The simplest of Google searches with just his team name and surname yields 124,000 hits, with some legitimate ones right on the first page such as one, two, and three as examples. And even if one was unaware that arguably the most famous football team in the world didn't used to have a different name, a click on "what links here" would have made that clear. Clicking on the Russian version of this article, which is very well referenced (ru:Дэвидсон, Уилл) would have found a good list of references which are primarily in English! This is a massive fail of WP:BEFORE, and I don't understand User:Williambellwisdo claim that it is not sourced, nor do I understand User:LBHS Cheerleader clearly not doing the most basic research before agreeing. Nfitz (talk) 20:25, 22 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment This is the first articles for deletion I had created - in general, as I understand it at least, doesn't there have to be some amount of coverage not just incidentally of the person, but about the person themselves? All I can find for this guy is listings of their lineup when he happened to have played or at most very brief snippets - nothing that tells us about him other than that he existed. For example: here, here, here, here, and here. Overall there is nothing written about Will Davidson alone, but only about the team during that time in which he is sometimes mentioned. Sorry about the formatting - I don't know what went wrong. -William (talk)

There seems to be plenty of writing about him in 100-year old documents, some of which can be found in Google Books. Not much in the current papers ... - but it's for situations like this, that we have WP:BEFORE and subject-specific notability guidelines - specifically WP:NSPORTS where if you scroll down to WP:NFOOTBALL which notes that Players who have played, and managers who have managed in a competitive game between two teams from fully-professional leagues, will generally be regarded as notable. . So 40+ matches with Manchester United (or whatever they called themselves back then) is so far past the bright line that as long as we can verify that they actually exist and did indeed do what was said, then there's no point pulling out 100-year old documents to prove notabilty. Nfitz (talk) 14:53, 23 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep per WP:NFOOTBALL. He retired due to a serious injury. There's probably some published information about that, but it might not be online. This might require physical research of archives from the 1894-1895, possibly including a visit to Manchester. There may even be a related obituary, because medical care wasn't great back then. Jack N. Stock (talk) 05:02, 28 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, might be able to tease a death date out of genealogical data and find an obituary. How many William Davidson's could be born in Scotland and living there in the 1891 census ...gosh about 20 per year it would seem. Well, maybe not ... need another clue. Oh well, doesn't matter, still notable - though an obituary sure would help the article itself. Nfitz (talk) 17:13, 28 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Davidson was still alive in 1903 because he recruited Alex Bell for Manchester United. I wonder if he had some sort of formal relationship with the club at that time. Jack N. Stock (talk) 05:03, 2 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, good catch. I've been fishing in the 1891 through 1911 censuses, without much luck. There is one I fancied in Rochdale in 1901/1911, particularly after I realised his house backed onto a football pitch; but if he was in Ayr in 1903, that now seems unlikely. Presumably he was back in Ayr by 1903. Though that clue might help - wish the 1901/1911 Scottish censuses were more accessible without $. (I figure that if we can identify him genealogically, we can establish a date of death, find his obituary, and flesh out his article). Nfitz (talk) 00:23, 4 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And with that tidbit, I've got a possible 1901 census entry in Scotland, age 32, married, and working as a coal-miner in Ayr. The one thing that jumped out at me though was he was born in Annbank - where Davidson previously played football. No trace in 1911 though. A couple of death possibilities, but no media coverage I could see. Searching the media more generally, the only thing that pops in a January 13 1903 mention of the Alec Bell signing in the Athetic News (Page 8), referring to Will Davidson as "the Heathens’ old captain, and fair player ever donned a jersey, regards Alec. Beil, whom the United have just engaged. ae about good pivot can found Scotland." - well that seems notable. A proper $ research account to go through the British Newspaper Archive further would be of use - especially to download that particular page, because clearly the OCR in the search results is a bit lacking!. That's a good 2-hours+ digging. Maybe someone can take that someday and find something - 50 years from now or something. Nfitz (talk) 01:19, 4 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in WikiProject Football's list of association football-related deletions. Spiderone 07:43, 30 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - meets WP:NFOOTBALL. Needs improving, not deleting. GiantSnowman 08:33, 30 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sportspeople-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 04:15, 31 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - Passes NFOOTY, has played senior international football, in a fully professional league or in a match in the competition proper (i.e. not qualifying rounds) of a cup competition which involved two teams both from FPLs. Fenix down (talk) 11:52, 1 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - Easily passes WP:NFOOTY. Smartyllama (talk) 15:24, 1 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - passes WP:NFOOTY with ease, notability is not temporary. There is significant coverage, implying that the subject passes WP:GNG and just because the subject and sources are a 100+ years old doesn't count either as notability is not temporary. Inter&anthro (talk) 15:40, 3 June 2017 (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.