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Burundi women's national football team

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Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch article reassessment page • Most recent review
Result: delisted (t · c) buidhe 09:12, 14 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Per the criteria at WP:GACR, a Good Article should be well-written, verifiable with no original research, broad in its coverage, neutral, stable, and illustrated if possible. This article severely struggles to meet the verifiable and broad categories, and with my own research mentioned at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Africa/Archive 12#African women’s football teams it seems like the topic does not pass WP:GNG (as WP:NTEAM says it should, for the record) and ought to be merged into a new article on Women's football in Burundi or outright AFDed. Keep in mind that there really isn't a true women's national team, just a youth team and and adult team that occasionally are organized (one does not appear to currently exist). As for the specific issues:

  • Most of the academic sources cited here make zero mention of a Burundi women's national football team. Many don't even mentioned Burundi, they speak of generalities about women's football in Africa.
  • While the sport grew in popularity worldwide in the ensuing years, Burundi did not have an official team until more than two decades later. A likely WP:SYNTH violation, since ref #3 (an old Fifa database page) is dead and ref #4 makes no mentioned of when the team was first established, or makes any comment on the "growing popularity" of football during this time.
  • The team has withdrawn from numerous other events. Also seems like a WP:SYNTH violation, which is cited to two dead refs and another which is just a chart of women's championship games from the Confederation of African Football (CAF).
  • Burundi was scheduled to participate in a competition in 2007 organised by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) in Zanzibar. Nicholas Musonye, the secretary of the Council for East and Central Africa Football Associations (Cecafa), said of the event, "CAF wants to develop women's football in this region in recognition of the milestones Cecafa has achieved over the years. CAF appreciates what Cecafa has done despite the hardships the association has gone through, from financial problems to political instability in member states and poor management of associations. Member states in the Cecafa region have not taken women's football seriously. CAF now wants to sponsor a long-term campaign to attract women from this region into the game."[16] The competition was canceled due to lack of funds.[17] Aside from the first sentence, this whole paragraph is not about a Burundi women's national football team. GA criteria requires that an article "stays focused on the topic". This could simply be trimmed down to they were scheduled to participate in a contest that was cancelled.
  • Burundi has not participated in other major events on the continent, including the 2011 All-Africa Games. Another likely WP:SYNTH violation, shows another CAF chart of games in which Burundi is not mentioned. It is pure WP:OR to describe what is not mentioned in a given source.
  • The development of women's football in Africa faces several challenges, including limited access to education, poverty amongst women, inequalities and human rights abuses. Cool, but not about a national team and not even about Burundi. While the same probably applies to Burundi, we need a source which says so. It's not good logic to use a source which says "Africa has problems" to mean "X country in Africa has problems".
  • The Football Federation of Burundi, the country's national association, created a woman's football programme in 2000.[3][5][23] By 2006, there were just 455 registered women players, and the absence of a thriving women's game has been an obstacle for the national team.[24] Lydia Nsekera is the head of the national football association.[25] Outside the national federation, the Commission nationale du football féminin was established by the 1990s, and a league and women's teams were organised in the same period in Bujumbura. About women's football in Burundi, but not about a national women's team.
  • The "Home Stadium", "Managers", and "Coaching staff" sections are all empty, and these things probably barely exist, since the team exists on an on-off ad hoc basis.
  • The majority of the article is taken up by CRUFTy infoboxes and tables of records and scores, all of which have zero sources.
  • The only materials which seem to directly address the sometimes existence of this team are FIFA documents, but those might lack independence. My WP:BEFORE turns up only really this which gives the name the women's team uses and nothing more. I've searched under the sports section of Iwacu, Burundi's only private newspaper, and gotten mention of women's football but nothing about a national team. There's little hope for expanding this article using reliable secondary sources about the topic.

I advocate delisting and probably eventually deleting or merging to a new Women's football in Burundi article (an actually notable topic). The existence of this article seems to totally hinge on false expectations that a national sports team is/should be notable. Sorry to say, that is not the case here by my read. But I open the floor to others who may have new sources or ideas. Courtesy @Aircorn: who first brought this to my attention. -Indy beetle (talk) 03:57, 19 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Agree generally with the above but as for merging altogether, the team are active in AFCON qualifying this season - if that doesn't confer notability on its own, I'd suggest that it at least indicates the team is becoming more active and warrants a 'stay of execution' for the NT article, pending the evidence of their involvement in other upcoming tournaments? Crowsus (talk) 09:40, 19 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I mean I see no rush per se -it's not like this is a vandalism magnet or major BLP violation risk- but we don't have a WP:CYRSTAL ball which tells us that Burundi's team is going to get SIGCOV in such an event. At best it's WP:TOOSOON. -Indy beetle (talk) 02:54, 20 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
For reference, this is what the article looked like when it was promoted; 2/3 of what is written is not about a Burundian women's national team. -Indy beetle (talk) 07:37, 22 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I would delist from GA, but keep the article. Nehme1499 16:10, 22 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I remember these African women's team GAs were done as a sort of 'job lot' in a single splurge of creativity which was a very impressive feat. There are some imperfections, for example In 1985, almost no country in the world had a women's national football team is obviously false in light of things like 1984 European Competition for Women's Football qualifying and 1983 AFC Women's Championship. While The senior national football team has never competed in a FIFA-sanctioned fixture seems to be out of date, considering the team is currently competing in the 2022 Africa Women Cup of Nations qualification. I suppose the complained of imprecision will be there until someone writes an academic paper focused specifically on women's football in Burundi. So I could live with a delisting, but talk of AfD or redirection is a bit much.
There is no doubt that the senior team currently exists, they named a 30-player squad earlier this month: [1]. In March 2016 (four years after the article was created) the national team had still never played a match, but its formation was allegedly a priority for the FFB: "The Burundi Football Federation (FFB) plans to expand the women’s game. A priority for the FFB’s 2015-18 development strategy is to get a squad up and running. The national team has never played a match – a frustration for Saidi. Funding shortfalls and the lack of equipment have hampered its development, meaning it has not managed to play the five matches against Fifa-ranked teams that it needs to get an official ranking." They definitely played at the 2016 CECAFA Women's Championship:[2] and I found a pre-tournament friendly in which they were beaten 3–0 by eventual winners Tanzania: [3]
They were slated to play at the 2018 CECAFA Women's Championship ([4]) but when it was shambolically postponed at four days notice, they weren't at the edition which went ahead: [5] They played at 2019 CECAFA Women's Championship and reached the semi-final. It's not clear what happened to the 2021 CECAFA Women's Championship after Djibouti pulled out of hosting it. I can't read French/Swahili/Kirundi and (until today) my knowledge of Burundian football was nil, but I have certainly found some coverage of the matters inhibiting the women's national team. Lack of funding, prejudice against women etc. [6], [7] The coach Daniella Niyibimenya (yes she exists!) has complained about a lack of friendly matches to sharpen up before the tournaments: [8] While Lydia Nsekera says a lack of female representation in the corridors of power has held back the development of women's football: [9]. Bring back Daz Sampson (talk) 15:52, 23 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the Jimbere Magazine source, I had never encountered it before and it does seem to give good coverage to the women's team. I've added coverage about the 2019 CECAFA Women's Championship to the article, but I don't think there's enough to rescue this GA entirely. -Indy beetle (talk) 05:45, 24 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not suggesting that all of them need to be delisted, but quite a few do. Depending on how this GAR goes, it could be a precedent for the other national teams listed above. Nehme1499 09:35, 25 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • They all probably need some improvement. The Zanzibar article actually looks quite salvageable, and since Rwanda tends to punch above it weight in media I'd bet there's some sources that could be found to improve it. Others, like the Central African Republic and Niger, probably should have never been promoted in the first place. Same problems with women's programs that have barely gotten of the ground and issues with text and sources pointing to challenges for women's football in Africa generally, but not actually discussing those countries specifically. -Indy beetle (talk) 10:54, 25 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
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