Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/1872 FA Cup final/archive1

Image review

• Don't use fixed px size

• Marindin_1892.png: what's the status of this work in its country of origin? Nikkimaria (talk) 00:27, 27 July 2026 (UTC)
  • @Nikkimaria: - I don't know how to work that out. It was printed in a book published in 1892 (134 years ago) and the only credit is the name of a photographic studio/company, not a named individual. Does that help.....? -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:14, 27 July 2026 (UTC)
    • If you follow this flowsheet, where do you end up? Nikkimaria (talk) 00:32, 28 July 2026 (UTC)
      • @Nikkimaria: I don't know how to answer the very first question "is the author known?" We know that the photo was taken by a company/studio, but does that count as the author being known, given that no specific named individual is listed as having pressed the button......? -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:34, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

        No - if the specific person was not identified, that would count as unknown. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:26, 29 July 2026 (UTC)

        @Nikkimaria: - I added what I believe to be the relevant template -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 10:25, 29 July 2026 (UTC)

        Per that template, "please specify in the image description the research you have carried out to find who the author was". Nikkimaria (talk) 23:56, 29 July 2026 (UTC)

        @Nikkimaria: - added -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:21, 30 July 2026 (UTC)

Comments from Bgsu98 (7/27/26)

I will review this for you tomorrow! Bgsu98 (Talk) 00:44, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

• @Bgsu98: - thank you!! -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:14, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

The biggest issue that appears throughout the article is the use of "the Wanderers" versus "Wanderers". It reads awkwardly without the "the". So, the first sentence would be "The 1872 FA Cup final was an association football match between the Wanderers and the Royal Engineers on 16 March 1872 at Kennington Oval in London."

@Bgsu98: - the thing is.....we do generally talk in those terms in British English. This article, for example, is headlined "Looking at Michael Wimmer's career since he nearly joined Bristol Rovers as head coach in 2024", not "...since he nearly joined the Bristol Rovers". Similarly, this one is headlined "Can you remember the six Americans who have played for Bolton Wanderers?" not "...who have played for the Bolton Wanderers?", and this one says "You played for Wolverhampton Wanderers for over 13 years" not "You played for the Wolverhampton Wanderers". Literally not a single British football fan would ever refer to "the Wolverhampton Wanderers" or "the Bristol Rovers" or "the Queens Park Rangers". Specifically pertinent to this article, this page uses "However, he played under the pseudonym of AH Chequer as he had already played for Harrow Chequers in an earlier round", not "the Harrow Chequers". This one says "John Hawley Edwards played for Wanderers in London" not "the Wanderers". This page, from the FA itself says "Wanderers beat Royal Engineers at Kennington Oval in London before a largely middle-class crowd of 2000 who each paid a shilling to watch." not "the Wanderers beat the Royal Engineers" -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:20, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

• I thought about that, except you also use "the Wanderers" and "the Engineers" throughout the article. Bgsu98 (Talk) 11:14, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

• @Bgsu98: - everything should be consistent now -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 11:21, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Background

• "Although fifty clubs were members of the FA, only twelve opted to take part and three of these then withdrew; a further six clubs then decided to enter, taking the total number of entrants to fifteen." --> The section in italics reads a little awkwardly. Perhaps replacing "and" with "although". The use of two "thens" in such close proximity should also probably be avoided.
  • Changed -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:28, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Route to the final

• the Harrow Chequers
• the Clapham Rovers
• the Hampstead Heathens
  • See above -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:28, 28 July 2026 (UTC)
• "in a match which ended in near darkness after starting late due to the late arrival of a number of players" --> Too many "lates" in close proximity.
  • Changed -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:28, 28 July 2026 (UTC)
• "Rather than be made to replay the match, however, both teams were permitted to go through..."
  • I think "be made to" is needed, otherwise it sounds like it was the teams' own choice not to replay the game, which wasn't the case -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:28, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Summary

• "The newspaper described his performance as a whole as "perfect"." --> Is there any other way of phrasing this that avoids the duplicate "as"?
  • Changed -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:28, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Post-match

• "at the annual dinner of the Wanderers at the Pall Mall Restaurant, Charing Cross, on 11 April." --> I feel like there should be a preposition (like "in") used in place of a comma between "Restaurant" and "Charing Cross".
  • Changed. You can't really say that a location is "in" Charing Cross, because it's a large road intersection, not a district. So I change it to "in London" -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:28, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

User:ChrisTheDude: I did not mention every instance where a team's name should have a "the" in front of it. Please let me know when you have had a chance to examine my comments. Bgsu98 (Talk) 01:12, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

• See my comment above. In British English it is normal to refer to teams in that way -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:28, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

• Support. If that's how it's done in the U.K., then that's how it's done. I also have Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Figure skating at the 2010 Winter Olympics – Ice dance/archive1 here if you have a minute and are so inclined. Bgsu98 (Talk) 12:13, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

• @Bgsu98: - many thanks for your review and I will certainly look at your nom in due course -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 12:42, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

MSincccc

• Placeholder. MSincccc (talk) 17:27, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

Background

• The clubs taking part were mostly based in London and the surrounding area, but also included the leading team in Scotland, Queen's Park.[6]
  • I could not access the source. Does it support the fact that they were the best?
    • I am not in the same town as my books at the moment so can't check myself, but I added another source which hopefully covers that specific point --ChrisTheDude (talk) 18:53, 5 August 2026 (UTC)
• We could include a link to "crème de la crème" from Wikitionary.
  • Done -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 18:53, 5 August 2026 (UTC)
• As was common at the time, both teams focused mainly on attack rather than defence,[9] Royal Engineers lining up with seven forwards and Wanderers with eight.[32]
  • This sentence could be rephrased.
  • How about As was common at the time, both teams focused mainly on attack rather than defence.[9] Royal Engineers lined up with seven forwards and Wanderers with eight.[32]
    • Done -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 18:53, 5 August 2026 (UTC)
• We could link to obituary.
  • Done -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 18:53, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

Bottom line

• ChrisTheDude That's all from me. A fine prose as always.

We might as well preserve this article for 2072. Thoughts? Best, MSincccc (talk) 17:33, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

@MSincccc: - many thanks for your review! If I am still alive in 2072 I will be sure to nominate it for OTD :-) -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 18:53, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

@ChrisTheDude All's fine then, thanks for the responses. Happy to support. MSincccc (talk) 08:39, 6 August 2026 (UTC)

Z1720

• Recommend adding a level 3 heading to "Match" to split up the "Summary" section: Perhaps "Pre-game and personnel" and "Match summary" or something similar?
• I made some copyedits to the article. Feel free to revert if not helpful.
• Removed instances of repetitive, consecutive refs.
• Lead check: information is in the article.
• Infobox check: "Alfred Stair (Upton Park)": This is the only mention of Upton Park in the article. What is this referring to? Should this be added to the article body somewhere?
• Ref 51: Author listed as "Tomás Hill López-Menchero"
• Ref 9: Author listed as "Tom Rostance"

Please ping upon responses. Z1720 (talk) 13:37, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

@Z1720: - all done I think. I had to take a guess as to exactly what parts of Tomas's rather long name are his surname.... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 15:34, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

• Support. Concerns resolved, no further comments. Z1720 (talk) 15:49, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

Source review (pass)

• Spotchecks not done. All references as of this version
  • The Guinness Football Encyclopedia and Soccer: The records - Noting that WP:GUINNESS has the world records as a situational source that does not count towards notability, but there is no indication that these publications has the same issues (and both predate the concerns of paid inclusion)
  • Capitalization of book titles is inconsistent (contrast the above-mentioned sources)
    • Fixed (hopefully) -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 13:13, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
      • Yep, looks good. — Chris Woodrich (talk) 15:23, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
  • ISBNs are inconsistent; some use ISBN-10, others use ISBN-13. This is allowed and recommended per Wikipedia:ISBN, and thus no action is required
  • Capitalization after colons is inconsistent (contrast 26 and 38)
    • Done (I think) -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 14:58, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
  • Any reason for not archiving 8, 27, 38, when you archive other internet-based sources?
    • I ran the IABot on the article and it archived one more source but that was it...... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 13:16, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
  • Similarly, inconsistent archiving for your newspapers.com sources (contrast 17 and 34)
    • See above -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 13:16, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
  • For newspapers retrieved via the BNA and Newspapers.com, I would recommend providing page numbers where available, as that will aid tracking down the physical article should the archives themselves ever shut down. You already do it for some items (43, 44)
    • Done -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 16:04, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
  • 26: Billy the Horse seems to be his nickname, which would make "Horse" part of a proper name (and thus capitalized). Unless he was actually a horse, in which case lowercase is consistent with the rest of the references
    • Yes, Billy the horse was an actual horse. See 1923 FA Cup final -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 13:13, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
  • 49: You don't normally include the publisher for online sources, so this is inconsistent.
    • Fixed -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 13:13, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
• Overall, very minor issues. — Chris Woodrich (talk) 12:55, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
  • @Crisco 1492: - responses above -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 16:10, 2 September 2026 (UTC)
    • Thanks. I'm happy to say that this is passes the source review. — Chris Woodrich (talk) 16:39, 2 September 2026 (UTC)