Talk:Unofficial Football World Championships

Nassazi and Virtual World Championship

I'm happy enough for NB to have been moved to being a section rather than a criticism, but I wonder whether, for the sake of consistency, the same should be done with the VWC: I have a notion that one day, when I have more time, I'll make an article for each of them. Kevin McE 11:03, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

• Articles for NB and VWC would be fine, though they should still be mentioned on UFWC page as they are close relatives. VWC can stay in the criticisms, as it is an example of something similar to UFWC that lacks the attribute being criticised. By contrast, all the criticisms of UFWC apply equally to NB (I don't see that UFWC taking extra time and penalties into account is something to criticise it for). Jess Cully 00:57, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I see that you have had a change of mind re VWC. I hope you don't mind if I revert to my original intro to it; phrases like "some people don't like" are not very encyclopedic. Kevin McE 12:24, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

List of Title Changes

Would such a list be unwieldly or could it work? Please tell me if it could.Toonmon2005 02:13, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

• You can find a full list of title matches on the UFWC promoters' site, which is linked at the bottom of the article. [1] Jess Cully 02:35, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
• I know that. I meant a list of title-holders during the history of the Unofficial Championship because the full list of title matches could bore somebody looking for a list of champions.Toonmon2005 04:00, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
• Consider it done:List of winners of Unofficial Football World Championships Kevin McE 10:51, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Ireland

The all Ireland team that took the title in 1903 is now the Northern Ireland national football team - see that page for details. Does anyone know when the team now called Republic of Ireland first took the title? Timrollpickering 09:25, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

30/03/77, beating France 1-0 in Dublin. They held the title for 2 months, with a home draw against Finland before losing it to Bulgaria in Sofia. Their only other reign was Mar-May 2004, gaining it from Czech republic and surviving 2 challenges before losing it to Nigeria. Kevin McE 16:51, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Website

ufwc.co.uk is no more. I seem to recall Uruguay being on the verge of entering the top 10, but I'm not sure. Does anyone have the full rankings saved anywhere?  sʟυмɢυм • т • c  19:20, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

The data from the previous matches is on the two other sites linked from the article page, but their tables are calculated on different formulae: RSSSF has a table of how many days the title has been held for, and WPFC (not updated since November last year) has a rather complicated set of weighted average points in championship matches. The number of championship match victories (which is what UFWC's table recorded) could be reconstructed fairly easily from that info. But does anyone know why UFWC.co.uk dissappeared so suddenly? Kevin McE 23:28, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Glad to report that www.ufwc.co.uk is back Kevin McE 10:52, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Awesome.  sʟυмɢυм • т • c  21:16, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Rankings

There is no one method of ranking the holders of this title: RSSSF uses number of days as title holders, WPFC uses a variant on 3 points for a win, one for a draw, UFWC uses victories in title matches. I think that if the infobox on this article shows one of those, then it is almost tantamount to promoting one source over another, and therefore promotional. All respect to those who have done so much work at UFWC, but I do not think that a Wiki article should present it as superior.

I would propose, therefore, a table similar to the one I have made at List of winners of Unofficial Football World Championships which could list all the credible ranking criteria, possibly with the position a country wouldhold in brackets in each column, thus indicating that Scotland would be (1) for No of days, wins, and matches as champion, but (2) for number of spells as champion, and about (40) for time since title last held. The corrolary to this acknowledgement of multiple criteria would be removal of the rankings field in the infobox. Thoughts? Kevin McE 11:08, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Some elements under "Rules" would also need changing. The rankings are now included in the table in the list of winners article, although I acknowledge that it is not appropriate to that title.Kevin McE 02:52, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

No comment has been passed on my suggestion in more than a week, and so I have been bold and made the changes I proposed above. Kevin McE 21:39, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

AfD prod

I am dissappointed that someone took it upon themselves to post a prod without discussion of the issues here first. The opening statements in the article draw on a near 40 year history of discussion, and the fact that this article cites, and draws upon data from, 3 independent websites, which have been referenced in Four Four Two and the Guardian, among others, proves that it is not original research. Kevin McE 21:38, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I listed the Rugby one for deletion - and it was deleted - which I think was the logic behind prodding this; but its fairly obvious that this has had a number of published sources, books, articles etc. discussing it outside of Wikipedia. --Robdurbar 08:54, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Sortable table

I came across the very nifty sortable table function while looking at other Wiki pages, and thought it would be good here, but although the function works accurately for the first 4 headings, it will not do so for the final three. Any ideas as to why? Kevin McE 09:55, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm in favour of the sortable table, the rankings table on this page just seems to fit perfectly. I don't know why it wouldn't work, maybe the dates of when the country last won the title needed to be wiki-linked. I would remove all the ranks by each criteria, just leaving each country's record. Ross1 10:24, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Done it now: the problem was two columns of data under one heading, but it was able to overcome that for "Days as champion": I know not why. I can only get dates to sort by using the rather ugly YYYY-MM-DD format. I had to take out all the ranking scores, which was a nuisance as they has taken me ages to put in, but if sortable tables had existed/I had discovered them at the time, I would have used them when I made the table. Kevin McE 12:45, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Good work. --Guinnog 12:46, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I see that somebody has wikilinked all the dates. I acknowledge (and had already done so: see above) that the YYYY-MM--DD format is ugly, but the wikified alternative means that no meaningful sorting by dates can be done: I consider that a lessening of the utility of the article.

So: sortability, or ability to choose how it appears: which is preferable? Kevin McE 19:30, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Unless, of course, one can use <span style="display:none">YYYY-MM-DD</span> [[DD Month]] [[YYYY]] to get around the impasse, and have both. Kevin McE 21:26, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Infobox

I just integrated the 'next match' infobox into the top infobox. If anyone thinks the old format was better, I'm open to their opinion.  Sʟυмgυм • т • c  20:51, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Criticisms and right to reply

The criticisms in the section thus named are unsourced, and if they are no more than queries/observations thrown up by editors here, they are WP:OR. Addition of the rebuttal of these is to make the article page itself a place of debate, which does not seem to be appropriate for an encyclopaedic piece. I would propose that we take the sort of action proposed for trivia sections: that which can be verified and cited should be placed in more appropriate sections: that which cannot should be deleted as OR. Thoughts? Kevin McE 09:22, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd be fine with deleting the whole Criticisms section as it really is no more than a discussion about the merits or flaws of the UFWC. Someone else posted the criticisms, I posted the replies in response to a general request by the UFWC webmaster. The lack of official status is already mentioned at the top of the article; the reference to FIFA's response to it could be inserted elsewhere; the rest is just opinion. The section wouldn't be missed. Jess Cully 22:04, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Editing articles to include non-verifiable information requested by the subject of the article would seem to be to be a conflict of interest. --Pak21 07:06, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

The criticisms are no more verifiable than the rebuttals. If either is removed, the whole section should go. Jess Cully 22:38, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Unlisted match

Greece, while UFWC holders, played a friendly against Czech Republic on 5th Feb 2008 but this match was not listed at FIFA.com, and therefore is not regarded as a title match. Similar matches of disputed status have occued in the past (e.g. Colombia vs South Korea), but since 1980, FIFA have logged all "A" international matches, and inclusion in their listing is the criterion for this title's deciding matches. In the event, Greece won the match, and so any difference would only have been in statistics of number of matches for Greece, and not for tenure of the honour. Kevin McE (talk) 00:48, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

I haven't understand why that match against Czech Republic is not listed while that one against Finland is. I'm talking about FIFA not wikipedia. - Sthenel (talk) 07:21, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Greece's next title defence will be against Portugal in March. I advice you to look at FIFA's website. It looks like there ain't problem in counting on the fixtures lists present in it. 82.240.207.81 (talk) 15:36, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Is the match of Greece against Portugal listed in the official website? - Sthenel (talk) 21:35, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

The match against Czech Republic didn't count, but the match against Finland did. This is what the UFWC website said the next day:

Okay, this is complicated: This match (between Greece and Finland on 6 February) is part of the friendly Cyprus International Tournament, also involving the Czech Republic and Poland. On the previous afternoon, 5 February, a Greece side played a Czech Republic side. This was regarded by both sides as a ‘training camp’ match, and featured many reserve and under-21 players. Crucially, the match was NOT recognised by FIFA as an ‘A’ match and therefore does NOT count as a UFWC title match. 24 hours later, this match against Finland also featured several reserve players, but WAS recognised as a FIFA ‘A’ match. Therefore it WAS a UFWC title match. Phew.

Dinsdagskind (talk) 11:45, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

Tagged

An editor tagged this article as lacking notability and references in January. I replied on his/her talk page thus "I am surprised at the tags that you have posted on the UFWC article. It has a section that refers to some of the media references, the external links list all matches in which the title has been at stake. If anyone wishes to verify the information on the pages, the resources are there to do it." on 29 January 2008. The tagger, who had made no explanation of his objections at the time, made no response here, on my talk page, or on his/her own, within a week, so I removed the tags, explaining my actions in an editnote. Today, again without explanation, he/she has replaced the tags. I cite the above comments that I made to FN in January as the justification in removing them, and ask that he/she raise what are thought to bethe shortcomings of the article here before placing tags again. Kevin McE (talk) 16:05, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Why not just put references in and demonstrate notability? A single dead link does not constitute references Fasach Nua (talk) 16:16, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Done. It might have been more constructive if you had politely pointed out that the link was dead first time around, or when an enquiry was made in January. Kevin McE (talk) 20:26, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Sweden inconsistancies

It says sweden has been champion 5 times, had 26 matches and won 25 of them. that is impossible, because as 5 times champions they are also 5 times losers, so have lost at least 5 matches as champion. have i missed something? can someone clarify this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.159.2.32 (talk) 04:13, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Not a problem.

You are correct in saying that they are 5 times losers, but your misunderstanding is in saying that they won 25 of the 26 games that they played as champions: this is not what the table headings say. Of their 26 games as champions they won 20, drew 1, and lost (as you say) 5. They also won 5 championship matches, which their opponents started as championship holders, in order to start those 5 reigns, giving a total of 25 wins in championship matches. So they have in fact played in at least 31 championship matches, probably more (as unsuccessful challengers).

The table does not include unsuccessful challengers, as it would become unwieldy, and countries that have never held the title would have a null score in every column, but because of that, the unsuccessful challenges by those who are in the table are also unrecorded (in this table: they could be traced at other sites).

If you are comfortable with boxing parlance, the 26 would be title defences (successful or not), and the 25 would be title fights won Kevin McE (talk) 10:16, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

UFWC at the WC

You will see that I have a draft table posted, partly prompted by editors wanting to record the absence of the title from the forthcoming Euro 2008. Is the new addition appropriate/welcome/accurate/adequately formatted? I know that I have taken a short cut in not linking country names to nft articles: I can do that if the table is deemed keep-worthy.

Is it worth making something similar for the European or S American championships? I see strong arguments against doing so (it is a world, not a continental title; there will be far more non-appearances of the title; some might say we should list all Asian/CONCACAF/African/Oceania championships as well to avoid bias) but with Euro 2008 about to start (without the title), some readers might look for it, so I've had a go.

Thoughts? Kevin McE (talk) 09:09, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Most lost finals

Can't this statistic be included? The statistic of most wins is included, but most lost finals could also be quite interesting. Greetings from the Netherlands, Rubietje88 (nl) 21:48, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

What if a team ceases to exist whilst being UFWC?

What would be the case if a team were to cease to exist without having any succesor teams? An example that springs to mind is if East Germany had been UFWC at the time of German reunification then there would have been no champion as the German football team only uses the results of the West German team in its' records and statisitics. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.249.141.26 (talk) 12:18, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I doubt there is a formalised rule for this - the situation never occurred, so there is no precedent for that, and the UFWC rules don't include a provision for that scenario. My suggestion to solve it if it were ever to occur would be to draw analogies to boxing, where the idea for the UFWC came from. The World Boxing Association, on of the sanctioning bodies awarding world championships in boxing, has rules for the situation that, e.g., a title holder dies. Essentially, the title is declared vacant, and a fight for the title between two contenders chosen by a committee will follow. Generally, the two highest-rated fighters available should be chosen. SchnitteUK (talk) 17:46, 8 July 2014 (UTC)

That is a very good question. In the example cited, where East Germany held the title at the time of German unification, another option might be to assume the united German team has inherited the title. What if the Soviet Union or Yugoslavia had held the title during their country's breakup? Would the title have been inherited by Russia or Serbia? What if the country holding the title is banned by FIFA from playing any international games for, say, three years for some flagrant rule violation, would it hold the title during this period? Juve2000 (talk) 18:25, 8 July 2014 (UTC)

How to treat Various Yugoslavian/Serbian reigns

In the case of other nations that have changed name/flag, there has been a reign under the current incarnation, thus we can include West Germany's record under Germany, and Czechoslovakia's under Czech Republic etc without dificulty. In the Serbian/Yugoslavian case, it is not as clear cut, as the current name/flag combo have never been title holder. We have had for some time Serbia in the table, with a footnote to explain, a solution that I may have posted, but have never been totally happy with. An editor today put up a multi-flag solution, but that seems most inconsistent with what we have done for other cases: We don't have the Hammer and Sickle alongside the Russian flag. Maybe it is more appropriate to show the most recent "version" of the country to have won it: display FR Yugoslavia with the footnote edited to read "FR Yugoslavia (holders in 1995) were credited by FIFA with the records of the national teams of Kingdom of Yugoslavia (title holders in 1939), and SFR Yugoslavia (holders in 1984) until they in turn had their record assumed by Serbia." Opinions? Kevin McE (talk) 16:49, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

I think that's quite a good idea. Put it like that. Vanjagenije (talk) 19:29, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Infobox Colour

The infobox colour was changed to red when Spain won the title bout. Then it was changed back because 'colour scheme long predated Dutch reign'. Why should it not be red? I think that's a good touch. And on the flipside, why is it orange? --Half Price (talk) 14:23, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

I reverted away from red, because I assumed that whoever changed to red did so on the assumption that it was orange because of Dutch reign. It had been orange for all but the first 15 hours of the existence of the table, and the editor who hit on orange hasn't been active since November '05, so his/her original reason is unknown. But the orange is preferable to the dark red shade that had been there as a good contrast colour with the black text. I don't think it should change every time there is a new title holder: it is a colour for the title, not for the current holder, and some colours will be less suitable than others. Of course there are other colours that it could be: there are other colours of shirt that I could have put on this morning, but once one was chosen, it seems churlish to change for the sake of it. Kevin McE (talk) 20:26, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Hmm yea I can see the issue of having it suit team's colours. Orange does seem a bit odd though. It looks nice, but usually infoboxes are just blue/gray. --Half Price (talk) 12:34, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Table

The UFWC website lists nations in the table by the number of "title matches" won, whereas the list here goes by matches as "champions". In a few cases, this leads to a different ranking. I'm just wondering if we should go by the same criterion as the website when displaying the rankings here. Ը२ձւե๓ձռ¹⁷ 23:53, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Other sites, as the text explains, use different criteria. Our table is sortable, so the reader can look at it in whatever order he/she might wish, and it does not issue positions. Kevin McE (talk) 09:21, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Unofficial Women's Football World Championships?

Are there any informations for the Unofficial Women's Football World Championships? Maybe there could be some interesting statistics for discussion.. Celtic Angel (talk) 11:12, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

That certainly would be interesting, but has someone else done it? If we made it up ourselves, I'm afraid it would fail notability and would be original research. --Coemgenus (talk) 13:09, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

http://www.ufwc.co.uk/2011/05/england-women-defend-unofficial-title-against-sweden/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bettadeadthanred (talk • contribs) 15:49, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Well, in that case, go for it. I'd enjoy reading it. --Coemgenus (talk) 23:03, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

Any references for the "Similar concepts"?

I had a quick google, and I can't seem to find anything up to date and authoritative for Nasazzi's Baton or the Virtual World Championship, and I'm not sure the Pound for Pound World Championship is that notable (website here). Anyone mind if we just cut this section? LukeSurl ^{t c} 23:54, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

• There is an up-to-date Facebook group that enthusiastically follows the progress of Nasazzi's Baton. I for one would not like to lose it. Jess Cully (talk) 21:57, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
  • Cool. I've converted that to a ref tag. Is that page regularly updated (my French isn't that great)?. Ideally it be good to have a source, in English, that one can be assured will be always up to date. LukeSurl ^{t c} 19:43, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Game awarded

What if there's a UFWC game that will be later awarded by FIFA to either team because of, e.g., the fielding of an ineligible player? Or stopped for any reason and then awarded (like the Euro qualifier Italy vs Serbia)? Schnapper (talk) 14:23, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Has any title match happened like that yet? If not, then it's not an issue at this moment. But Italy - Serbia was awarded pretty quickly, it's only when results are overturned months late rthat it might need mroe discussion. Druryfire (talk) 15:48, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Should such complications arise, I think we basically follow whatever ufwc.co.uk do - they seem to be the "official" authority (irony intended). Nevertheless, there's no need to cover this in the article unless such a situation actually occurs. LukeSurl ^{t c} 01:39, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

I think the logical reply to that question would be to follow the game award of the federation that governed the game (e.g., FIFA). UFWC matches are subject to the rules that apply to the competition in which they are played; otherwise there would be no explanation why extra time and penalty shoot-outs are taken into consideration (the only reason why those occur is precisely because of the rules of the competition). SchnitteUK (talk) 17:03, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Original Research

The games of 2013 King's Cup are not listed by FIFA as official, which happened because a bureaucratic notification did not arrive on time. By Paul Brown's decision, these games were counted as UFWC title matches. While there are other cases of similar controversy, most recent being South Korea's win in 1995, they all took place when the procedure for official FIFA recognition was not well-established. Thus, UFWC has become Paul Brown's OR as of 23 January 2013. Netzakh[ˈneʦaħ] 17:16, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

While I agree with you that the UFWC has lost credibility over this (I certainly no longer have any interest in maintaining this page as it has ceased to follow any tenable definition of the title), we have no right to hold Paul's website to our standards and definitions of what is acceptable research, and given that this article remains based on that site, this article is not OR. Kevin McE (talk) 19:34, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Paul Brown is the UFWC. He created it, he runs it, and he decides what is what. This is an article about the UFWC competition. The UFWC is Paul Brown's original research as much as Hamlet is William Shakespere's. LukeSurl ^{t c} 19:48, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Not entirely true: it was tracked at RSSSF and, until the site went down, at WPFC. Brown's site is the only one kept currently (or at least until last week) reliably up to date. Kevin McE (talk) 20:44, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

The RSSSF page on this began in 2002 which predates any of Paul Brown's publications on the subject. This Wikipedia page should be modified to make it clear that RSSSF first published the concept, and that Brown is not (and never was) a definitive source, even if he did come up with the idea independently of the RSSSF authors, which seems unlikely given that (at the time) RSSSF was by far the most likely place for him to gather his list of results. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.113.110.214 (talk) 18:40, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Minor tournaments

All right: the Mundialito is no part of the Confederations Cup-history. However, couldn't we insert a paragraph on title changes during 'minor tournaments'?Jeff5102 (talk) 08:23, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm opposed really. I think the article is too long and detailed as it is, paying too much attention to the constructed history of something invented in 2003 borders on WP:Original Research. We have Chronology of the Unofficial Football World Championships which lists as a table the basic statistics of the progression of the championship. Frankly I'd prefer to condense "tracking the championship" and "UFWC at major championships" into four or five paragraphs of prose. We have to remember that this is an encyloepdia page about the UFWC, rather that an "official" UFWC tracker. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 11:25, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

The rules are wrong

I tried correcting the rules, but somebody changed them right back. According to the rules, a match doesn't have to be FIFA-accredited to be a title match. It should be enough being considered an A-match by the teams involved, which these matches were. Someone please correct this, so that the controversies over the title could come to an end. UFWC rules<Nukualofa (talk) 01:34, 31 January 2013 (UTC)>

Controversies over the rules do exist: it is our duty to report them, not to cover them over. Kevin McE (talk) 07:01, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

The rules are as followed: "A UFWC title match is any international ‘A’ match involving the current UFWC title-holder. According to FIFA: ‘An international ‘A’ match shall be a match that has been arranged between two national A associations affiliated to the Federation and for which both Associations field their first national representative team.’ This includes most friendly matches." At no place does it mention that the match needs to be FIFA-accredited, it simply uses the FIFA definition of an A-match. Both Sweden and Finland considered this an A-match, and by all means North Korea did too. Saying that "whether or not the match is considered a title match is at organiser Paul Brown's discretion" is misleading. It is correct because he set the rules, but it is misleading because those rules were followed in the King's Cup matches. The facts that the King's Cup matches have a history of being A-matches, the involved FAs considered them A-matches, the squads mainly consisted of established internationals, and that the only reason these matches are not considered A-matches are because of an organizational fail, any dispute should be put aside by now.{Nukualofa (talk) 10:17, 31 January 2013 (UTC)}

I've made a subtle changing of wording: "The next full international (now defined by the standards of a FIFA-accredited international 'A' match) involving the title holder is considered a title match." I hope this helps. LukeSurl ^{t c} 10:25, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

References

Chronology of the UFWC list

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chronology of the Unofficial Football World Championships resulted in the separate Chronology of the Unofficial World Championship page being deleted. The results were pretty split between merge and delete but I found a good compromise between the two camps: I went ahead and merged the data from the Chronology page into the main page using a collaspable wikitable. That way everyone who wants to see the list can see it and it is out of the way for everyone else. I personally feel that the list is vital to the article. I don't see having one without the other, especially seing as the history section of this article pretty much is a summary of that list. Tavix |  Talk  21:56, 19 June 2014 (UTC)

For the record I agree with the complete erasure that Sionk is enforcing. The deletion wasn't about just space, rather its to make sure Wikipedia isn't being used as a statistical database, which is effectively a form of original research. In my opinion the "Tracking the championship" section should be reduced to a couple of paragraphs and should not attempt to be comprehensive. This article is meant to be an overview of the UFWC as reported by reliable sources, and not a place to output all results from what is essentially a three-line algorithm. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 07:47, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

• When I orginally came here, that is what I wanted. It was a good complement to the history section to see how the championship changed hands as I was reading. I thought it would be a good addition. It doesn't take up that much space, only 15kb, which was less than half of the article (including the heap of tables that the article already has). If you really want to be so strict about that WP:NOTSTAT thing, you should go ahead and delete all of the tables from the article. I don't see why you are picking and choosing. I'd rather have a chronology than a several tables of major tournaments where it was contested. You can have that as a sidenote from the chronology. It just doesn't make any sense to me. Tavix |  Talk  14:44, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Well, from my point of view I would prefer to delete all the stats/results tables that are already covered elsewhere, or are entirely WP:OR! But with the "Chronology" list in particular, this was discussed at AfD and a decision was reached that it wasn't appropriate for Wikipedia in any form. If you disagree with that decision you should take the AfD to Deletion Review. Sionk (talk) 14:55, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

If you really want to be so strict about that WP:NOTSTAT thing, you should go ahead and delete all of the tables from the article - Yes, I think this should be done. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 15:40, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

The big table...

The big rankings table was problematic to me. It was pretty squarely original research, as the calculations to create it from the list of all-time results were far beyond the realms of WP:CALC. I assume for the most part its accuracy relies on each successive editor assuming it was already accurate before updating it in regards to the latest match - this is not a good system. Additionally the finer details of the ranking system were arbitrary with no references to suggest this is the 'correct' way of ranking.
I therefore have WP:BOLDly replaced the table with a table that replicates and references the UFWC site's table. Critically, this is verifiable in a way that the current table is not. I am keeping it to the top ten teams for neatness, and mentioning the ranking of the current champion (and an explanation of Scotland's dominance) in prose at the table base. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 22:46, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Continual reversion by IPs

Edits to this article by various users are being reverted by IPs without explanation. Further to the notifications on their talk pages, can I please invite 132.244.72.4 and 80.229.20.182 to discuss their edits here. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 09:57, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

• Adding a {{help me}} here, asking for an uninvolved editor's appraisal. While I wouldn't be in WP:3RR danger if I reversed the latest reversion, I would prefer not to enter an edit war. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 12:45, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

Reply to {{help me}} request: I reverted to the last best version I could find and I warned both IPs for edit-warring. I will watch the page and the IP users and will report them to admin if they continue. We also might have to request page protection, but decided to try this first. —    Bill W.    (Talk)  (Contrib)  (User:Wtwilson3)  — 13:08, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

Keep the full table, don't remove it! The full table is more informative than the current small table.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.244.72.4 (talk • contribs)

Please see my comment in #The big table... above. While the full table contained more information, it was not verifiable, which is a key principle regarding how Wikipedia operates. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 13:32, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

After removing Luke's request for a Third Opinion (dispute resolution won't accept requests where there's been less than thorough talk page discussion), I took a look here and have re-reverted and re-warned 132.244.72.4. Everything said above by Luke and Bill W (who must have have lots of friends) is right, but I'd add that the restoration of this unsourced material also violates BURDEN. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 20:07, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

Last title matches?

I think it would add value to the article adding a table in the section Tracking the Champioship / current year of the last (say...) 10 title matches, something like:

Team 1	Score	Team 2	Date	Occasion	Location
Germany	1 : 0 aet	Argentina	2014-07-13	2014 FIFA World Cup Final	Rio de Janeiro
Netherlands	0 (2): 0 (4)(pen.)	Argentina	2014-07-09	World Cup Semi-Finals	São Paulo
Netherlands	0 (4): 0 (3)(pen.)	Costa Rica	2014-07-05	World Cup Quarter-Finals	Salvador, Bahia
Costa Rica	1 (5): 1 (3)(pen.)	Greece	2014-06-29	World Cup Round of 16	Recife
Costa Rica	0 : 0	England	2014-06-24	2014 FIFA World Cup Group D	Belo Horizonte
Italy	0 : 1	Costa Rica	2014-06-20	2014 FIFA World Cup Group D	Recife
Uruguay	1 : 3	Costa Rica	2014-06-24	2014 FIFA World Cup Group D	Fortaleza
Uruguay	2 : 0	Slovenia	2014-06-04	Friendly	Montevideo
Uruguay	1 : 0	Northern Ireland	2014-05-30	Friendly	Montevideo
Austria	1 : 1	Uruguay	2014-03-05	Friendly	Klagenfurt

Teams listed in Bold were the holders at the end of the match.

It gives a quick glance on the last title holders, as well as good examples of some of the title's rules. What do you think?146.155.157.13 (talk) 21:09, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

This seems to be a bit redundant to the top table, and its quite awkwardly placed in the article. I'm going to remove it. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 19:16, 19 November 2014 (UTC)

Remove UFWC at major championships

This section seems excessive and redundant to the prose description in the Tracking the Championship section. Any objections to removing this section on WP:INDISCRIMINATE grounds? --LukeSurl ^{t c} 15:10, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

OK, I've done it. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 08:16, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi @86.135.191.172:. I removed the section after no-one objected to this notice. Would you be interested in joining this discussion? --LukeSurl ^{t c} 15:18, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Unofficial Football World Championships. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110724094308/http://www.theawayend.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=377:pound-for-pound-world-championships&catid=64:world-champions&Itemid=128 to http://www.theawayend.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=377:pound-for-pound-world-championships&catid=64:world-champions&Itemid=128

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 15:55, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

Germany

A recent edit by 1joe60 (June 21 2018) added that East Germany statistics have been combined with West Germany in the Germany statistics. The UFWC website states:

East Germany never won the UFWC title, so have no ranking points to combine with a united Germany.

— UFWC

Therefore, should this be included, seeing as no East German statistics are merged into German statistics? --Philk84 (talk) 08:43, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

• It should not. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 09:19, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

• Looking through the matches, E Germany played 5 UFWC matches, but never won it. Regardless, we follow the source which explicitly excludes E Germany rather than making our own calculations. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 09:23, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

 Done Thanks for the clarification LukeSurl --Philk84 (talk) 09:31, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Since the ranking table includes matches played and not just matches won then it includes East Germany's title matches. Without East Germany's matches Germany should only be listed as having played 62 matches. The 5 East Germany matches can be found on the official UFWC website's results page. 1joe60 (talk) 12:36, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Philk84 I think your interpretation of that quote is incorrect. Although East Germany have no ranking points to combine with the united Germany they still combine statistics overall. In the case of UFWC "ranking points" are only wins however the table also tracks matches played and evidently that includes East Germany's matches. 1joe60 (talk) 12:36, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Maybe you are right? I did a search on the results page for "Germany", and Germany, East Germany and West Germany appeared in a total of 67 games, which matches the total number of games played on the rankings page. When they talk about "ranking points", I thought they were referring to all statistics - as there isn't a "points" tally displayed. --Philk84 (talk) 12:55, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

It's not entirely clear but my interpretation is that the author is mentioning that East Germany does not matter for "ranking points" because they never won. It can't be that he ignores East Germany completely because that contradicts his official ranking table's "matches played" column. Perhaps I should reach out to the author and seek clarification? 1joe60 (talk) 13:20, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

As for which nations to include a footnote for in my opinion it should be based only on nations who have actually combined statistics. Since East Germany have played matches it should be noted that their stats are included. FIFA recognized successor teams that did not participate in the UFWC should not be included such as Saarland for Germany. 1joe60 (talk) 12:36, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Huh, it seems you are right (and the UFWC FAQ is misleading). My apologies. --LukeSurl ^{t c} 12:50, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

References

Own Goals

Why does "Own goal" get removed from the list of scorers in the infobox? The first French goal against Croatia was an own goal, so now the list of goalscorers (which implies 3 goals have been scored) does not reflect the scoreline (where 4 goals where scored). I'm assuming there is some logic to this, but I'm not sure what it is. Can someone clarify this? To me it seems odd to omit this. --Philk84 (talk) 06:46, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

• We shouldn’t have a goal tally or goalscorers section at all. This part of the infobox is for ‘traditional’ tournaments which have a beginning and end, rather than the perpetual UFWC. It would make more sense to have a tally over *all* UFWC matches, rather than just the current holder’s current run, but this would be very heavy OR. —LukeSurl ^{t c} 08:31, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Suggestion for Overhaul and recalculation

I think Paul Brown made a mistake by considering victory by penalty shootout as a victory in the Unofficial World Championships. FIFA does not consider a victory by penalty shootout as a victory, but rather a draw. So, for example when Belgium defeated Spain on penalties in the 1986 World Cup quarter finals they should not have been awarded the title of Unoffical world champions. Rather, Spain should have held the title and gone out of the World Cup as champions. I would like to see the entire list recalculated on these grounds. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sexyeamo (talk • contribs) 01:21, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

We cannot do this. This article is about the UFWC, and must discuss it as it exists (i.e. as calculated by Paul Brown). This article cannot be used to create variants on Brown's method, this would be original research.

If you belive Brown should change his method I would advise you to ask him directly.

Alternatively, you could create your own website tracking your version of the championship. If this new website became sufficiently notable, it could be discussed in this article.--LukeSurl ^{t c} 14:49, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

List of champions

I have reverted an edit which added a "list of champions", which was a table listing all of the games where the championship changed hands. This is too much statistical information (see WP:NOTDATABASE and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chronology of the Unofficial Football World Championships already deleted similar content on these grounds. We already summarise the passage of the championship in prose in the "Tracking the championship" section and have summary statistics in the "All-time rankings" section. I appreciate that constructing this table must have been a significant amount of work, but I cannot say I see a place for it in this article. --LukeSurl ^t c 20:36, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

A radical idea, what if we were to include the table of championship games; and fold in everything that isn't simply "B won the championship from A, C won the championship from B" from the Tracking the championship section into a "Notes" column of the table, eliminating the need for that section. Sure, the table is essentially a database, but then again, so is the majority of the prose in effect. A handful of "Notes" column entries could make the UFWC at major championships section redundant as well. --LukeSurl ^t c 13:31, 12 October 2021 (UTC)

Euro 2004 (Greece and Czech Republic)

According to the article, Czech Republic took the title from the Netherlands at the 2004 Euro. Then it says they defended a few things before losing it to the Republic of Ireland, but they lost in the Euro to Greece (in overtime, if I recall correctly). Is there a mistake? 2601:189:8180:2EA0:5977:F2FA:20D2:224A (talk) 23:24, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

No obvious error. The UFWC wasn't taken into the 2004 Euros. The title moved betweeen European nations in qualifiers, but at the time of the finals the UFWC title was in Africa. --LukeSurl ^t c 16:25, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

Goalscorers in the infobox

The players who might have score goals during a team's time of holding the title are no more significant than any others who will have played. There is no other source that defines individuals as 'goalscorers during the current UFWC tenure', and therefore it is a breach of WP:SYNTH, and has been removed as such. Kevin McE (talk) 00:01, 8 December 2022 (UTC)

Removal has been reverted twice, once because it has been on the page for some time, once because it is "useful information" with no reasoning given as to why goalscorers are any more useful than any other player. Neither of these over-rule the prohibition in WP:OR Kevin McE (talk) 09:47, 8 December 2022 (UTC)

I must say that I agree with the two people that reverted your edit (and I would have done the same thing) and I agree with them to keep it, and this for several reasons (U):

- As far as I have could have checked the history, the decision to add the goalscorers on the page for the current holder of the UFWC is from 2013 ! So it is well established now that each time there an update on the goalscorers, we update this section. So, excuse me, but it is not normal that you decide alone, from one day to the other, to remove it from the page, although it exists since 2013. It seems that you are the only one to have a problem with that, and the majority wants to keep it. I seek in the history and it seems that you have never made edits/updates on the page, so I find it very confusing that you decide alone to remove something that is on the page since suche a long time.

- Furthermore, indeed the goalscorers that are presented are more important than the others because there are the one that help the current team to keep/retain the UFWC title. What's more, there are easy to find : you click and go on the page of the Croatia national football team, then you go on the Results and fixtures section and then on the 2022. You select the first match since when Croatia has the UFWC title and all the matches afterwards and then you have all the goalscorers for the current team who have the UFWC title.

- This section is properly deleted each time there's a new nation that win the UFWC title and we start from zero with the new goalscorers from the new nation. All the editors and fans of the UFWC title are really careful to edit/update the section with caution. So for example if tomorrow Brazil win against Croatia, we will start from zero with the new goalscorers for Brazil, if they win.

- I should have begin with that, but that does not matter : to begin with, we must be honnest and say that the whole concept of the Unofficial Football World Championships should not have a Wikipedia page in my opinion because this concept only exist for a few people/fans that created a Website and a forum, for me basically, it's like a fanfiction. But the Wikipedia page exists, Great, it's weird but great. So if you don't mind, if we want to add informations about the goalscorers that helped to retain the UFWC for the nation, we should have the right to do that ! Pindrice (talk) 21:48, 8 December 2022 (UTC)

Apart from gross erors of fact, you have singularly failed to address the only thing that makes any difference at all: Is the list of goalscorers sourced from a Reliable Source? It is not, it is synthesis. It is a gross simplification of the sport to declare goalscorers as more important than anyone else, especially if the direction of the title can be determined by a 0-0 draw. Kevin McE (talk) 13:01, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

WP:RS states, "you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article and directly support[b] the material being presented." If you cannot do that within 72 hours, I shall delete again. Kevin McE (talk) 12:53, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Like much of this article, it's pretty much WP:CRUFT. But, even worse, shouldn't be putting up ultra detailed information in an infobox like this Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 13:40, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

I'm on the "remove" side here. It is a level of detail that goes beyond what even UFWC actively tracks. During Italy's long run it became very long as well.

On a broader level, there is a danger that this article itself tries to supercede the UFWC's web presence in becoming the authority for this made-up "championship", covering a hypothetical lineage in far more detail than is appropriate.. --LukeSurl ^t c 22:16, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Croatia Matches played.

Acording to UFWC website, Croatia has played 22 matches but here it is listed 21. The official website includes matches when Croatia was part of Yugoslavia and during the puppet state years during WWII. 2800:B20:111A:1771:65A4:738F:BF9E:62 (talk) 17:58, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

original research?

Why do we consider the goal scorers orignal research when we list the top ten scorers for pretty much any league in the world? If one is orginial research then both should be considered original research (2601:543:4404:D170:D53F:127B:94CA:2C1C (talk)) 2601:543:4404:D170:D53F:127B:94CA:2C1C (talk) 03:23, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

External sources are not being updated

Brown has not updated the official UFWC website or its Twitter page since December 2022, missing four title matches. The Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics page also cuts off after the 2022 World Cup. At the moment it appears to be this Wikipedia article which functionally is the UFWC, which is a bit uncomfortable. The clockwork of the rules theoretically will run indefinately, but at some point it would seem necessary to consider the UFWC defunct and cease independantly tracking it. LukeSurl ^t c 10:04, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

A fan has picked up the baton on Twitter. We can keep going for the time being. Jess Cully (talk) 20:27, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

How on earth is that a reliable source? Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 20:33, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

@Lee Vilenski: The official Twitter account ceased making its own content long before and retweeted the fan account often. Human (talk) 02:19, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

That doesn't make it reliable. I'm not sure why we keep a track of the stats if no secondary reliable sources keep this information. I think stubifying makes sense here. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 08:04, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

"Stubify" seems like a bit much, but there's a lot of the article that was always pretty "OR-y", and becomes unsustainable in the absence of reliable sources. Our dilligence at keeping this page up-to-date has effectively made this an active tracker of the UFWC. We should completely lose the infobox, the All-time rankings section, and the UFWC at major championships section. Tracking the Championship should be reduced to maybe three or four paragraphs, without the attempt at comprehensiveness it is currently going for. LukeSurl ^t c 20:28, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

i still do think the matches will get updated when a new champion is crowned. They can't just disappear without an announcement. Human (talk) 19:30, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

That's not really a thing - we should summarise what reliable sources say about a subject. I don't know why we are echoing a lineage just from a primary source anyway, but if even that isn't updated, we shouldn't also do so. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 09:44, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

I've made some edits, mostly to the lead, to reflect the mostly-defunct nature of both "official" tracers of the UFWC. I've mentioned the Twitter account and explicitly cited it as the souce of the information for current champions.

I think this is sufficient to give the current champions, but not to support other details on the current state of the UFWC. Soon I'll make some edits, as described above, cutting a lot of the content that is too OR. LukeSurl ^t c 22:10, 13 October 2023 (UTC)

i got in contact with the fan account and they said the UFWC website and Twitter account owner ran into some logistical troubles and it will be updated by the end of this month. Human (talk) 00:33, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

Well the official Twitter account is up and they posted an update that the website will be back soon. Coincidentally new champions crowned too. Human (talk) 02:20, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

There's an official Bluesky account created recently, which is also verified through the domain of the UFWC website (ufwc.co.uk) - added to External Links Eh089 (talk) 22:06, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

Sierra Leone first title defense?

Do the CHAN matches count as an official team that will defend the title? Is it proper to add those matches for the UFWC or just wait for the CAN qualifier in november? 168.243.26.139 (talk) 21:03, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

According to CAF themselves, FIFA decided to recognise all CHAN fixtures as 'A' matches from 2014 onwards. It is unclear whether the qualifiers count or not as Paul Brown apparently abandoned UFWC some while ago. It is now managed by someone else who got access to the website and social media accounts. I just put whatever the next match for Sierra Leone shows up in their fixture list. Human (talk) 10:22, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

@LukeSurl @Lee Vilenski @Jess Cully @Kevin McE would you give your opinions here? Human (talk) 18:22, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

On the face of it, if the matches are considered full internationals (ie in the Rankings calculations) then they should be included, even if FIFA does not recognise the competition.

However, our opinion should be entirely irrelevant, as it is OR. If there is no secure definition of what constitutes qualifying status for this match, and no legitimate authority to make a determination in cases of dispute, then the entire concept is dead in the water. I lost interest in this over the 2013 King's Cup fiasco: at that point, it ceased to have any legitimacy as far as I am concerned. Kevin McE (talk) 19:45, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

I agree with the last statement. RSSSF has a sligtly different list of matches and winners after King's Cup which differs from Paul Brown's version. Now Brown himself is no longer associated and gave it up to someone else. It totally depends on what outside discussion boards think. Human (talk) 20:15, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

What does the subject say? Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 17:44, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

I’d say go with whether FIFA judge the match to be an official A international. Jess Cully (talk) 21:57, 12 November 2024 (UTC)