Wikipedia:Peer review/Sydney Riot of 1879/archive1

Sydney Riot of 1879

I'd like to bring this article up to FA status. Any advice/assistance would be appreciated, jguk 15:16, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

• Some issues I noticed:

1. First two sentences don't make much sense - perhaps they should be expanded to a larger paragraph with more information about the "early riots" and what the England-Australia tours were.

2. Perhaps a "pitch invasion" could be explained a little bit.

3. A N Hornby should be more formally introduced; we don't hear about him at all before he is dropped into the middle of the story.

4. "Nearly one hundred and thirty years later, bad umpiring decisions and betting continue to scandalise the sport." 3rd paragraph of "the game" - doesn't make sense, doesn't seem to fit in here. Talk more about the allegations against the bookmakers. More reponses from other newspapers and others involved would be helpful too.

5. remove "as we shall see", not encyclopedic language, 4th paragraph "the game"

6. I'm not sure about keeping those two letters intact - could they be summarized and quoted instead?

7. More info on the aftermath, if possible

8. In general, more images would be helpful (any team photos anywhere? photos of the field where the game was played?)

That's what I can see for now... I'll take another look after you make some headway... --Spangineer ∞ 20:44, Feb 5, 2005 (UTC)

Apologies for not looking at these earlier. I'm now working my way through them, and this response will, shortly, cover all 8 points:

1. I've expanded the first paragraph and tweaked the sentences.

2. I think this phrase has now been removed.

3. I've added a subordinate clause offering a factoid about Hornby, who has his own article for those who want to know more.

4. I have removed the offending sentence.

5. This is no longer in the article.

6. I've put them onto Wikisource. However, the letters are very interesting and add a lot to the tale. Wisden at the time felt it was worth devoting the space to them despite space being at a premium. I'm getting a new book that's a diary of one of the English players who played in the match, and Ianbrown's checking his library for what should be a good Australian source - we'll have to see afterwards whether the full text of the letters can be dispensed with, but at the moment I'm loath to lose them.

7. I've slightly expanded this. Of course, the letters themselves are part of the aftermath and these are quoted above. In the end, money won out - English clubs were missing out on cash by not playing the Australians, so they had to back down somehow.

8. Put simply, I haven't been able to find any photos. I have a number of books that cover the era and have searched on the internet - I can't see any team photos and none of what the SCG looked like at that time.

jguk 21:42, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)