Talk:Lee Bowyer

Neutral?

Is this really neutral? There seems to be a complete absence of a mention of his considerable footballing talent, and instead a raging focus on his misdemenours. The final line certainly is 'wrong'. Prior to leaving Newcastle (i.e. in the past season) his form was superb, and indeed he never really had a bad time of it whilst with any side - unless the side itself was doing badly.--Koncorde 10:13, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Can it really be proved that Venables was jealous of Bowyer's talent? If it is Lee Bowyer claiming this himself, it should be written as such.

"Perhaps the most amusing of Bowyer's various racially motivated incidents was the December 19 2001, when the Mirror newspaper published front page, which next to an image of Bowyer's head exclaimed: "I'm the victim... wails boozing, pot smoking, violent, RACIST, cowardly, unapologetic, lying, odious transfer-listed Lee Bowyer (now try and sue us you little scum bag)"

It is popularly blamed on the Leeds administration for the deterioration of his career" This really need to be rewritten so that it makes sense...

Place of birth

The prose says Newham, the infobox says Canning Town. Obviously the two places are close, but does anyone have a source for the exact town? The cats need to be changed accordingly. I'm taking the People from London category off, because whether he's from Canning Town or Newham, he is necessarily from London, no point in overcategorising. Jdcooper (talk) 01:23, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Canning Town is an area in the London Borough of Newham so both are correct. However, we should stick to one or the other for consistency of style, I think, and I'll make the small change. I agree with removing the people from London cat. --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 09:15, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Personal life

This is the biography of a person. The fact that he's a living person, doesn't mean that notable facts of his life should not be included. Yet editor Struway2 deleted the whole "Personal Life" section. I happen to have created that section and I used only public sources for references, without any POV terms. What is the reasoning behind the removal, please? -The Gnome (talk) 07:56, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

First, a general note. Bowyer plays a sport in which people are passionately and sometimes irrationally interested, and his life both on and off the field has attracted controversy. Because the article itself is relatively short, it's a bio that needs particularly careful balance between covering the controversial aspects in enough detail for the reader to understand what Bowyer did or was accused of, and covering his 15-year football career likewise.

The WP:BLP policy requires that we write about living persons in a balanced way, suitable for an encyclopedia. The section opened by saying that Bowyer was born and raised in the East End of London, and its only other contents were two anecdotes from a lengthy feature article in the January 2003 issue of Observer Sport Monthly, one quoting a former teacher saying there were ethnic tensions and fights at his school in which Bowyer was not involved although he would have known people who were, and one giving a former girlfriend's story of the teenage Bowyer saying he was dumping her because she was part-Asian.

An up-to-date, comprehensive and balanced personal life section written in a neutral factual way would be a valuable addition to this article. The section as added spoke only of racial issues, and as such I removed it citing WP:BLP, WP:UNDUE in my edit summary. The fourth para of WP:Neutral point of view#Undue weight is particularly relevant.

Hope this makes it clearer. cheers, Struway2 (talk) 09:26, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. I agree with and, of course, abide by Wikipedia's guidelines. But the directive for a balanced biography does not mean that we omit mentions of controversies when there is no opposite opinion! If a person who is famous for one particular activity, e.g. a famous writer, becomes also widely known (which brings to the front WP:N) for something totally diferent though sinister (e.g. he's also a murderer), we are not supposed to om,it that from his Wiki entry. We are supposed to mention it, even if there is no "opposite" view, i.e. a view that would dispute his status as a murderer if, for example, he has been convicted by a court of law. In the case of Bowyer, all the incidents ended up in court and the additional information I sourced provides context. All perfectly legitimate by the guidelines set forth in WP:BLP.

We are, however, supposed to bring forth, in the Bowyer entry, his numerous, controversial and well-opublisized involvements in physical confrontations, along with any relevant instances in the public record (e.g. the break-up with his girlfriend on allegedly racial reasons). In case there is a need to improve these references, it should be accomplished by providing both sides of the account --which what I did (e.g. the testimony of his PE teacher who states that Bowyer himself was never involved in fights at school). I might have presented too much of one side but this doesn't mean that it shoild be deleted altogether!

Finally, the issue of this being a "short" entry for a biography. This should mean little, if anything, in context. Notability is, once again, our Wiki guiding light :-) If Bowyer, on account of his behavior and record, becomes as known for his views and/or actions on race matters as he is for his universally acknowledged football skills, it is not up to us to beautify his biography, nor to omit any notable events in the life of the person. You might be right that the article could be expanded although, personally, I cannot contribute to this end, since I believe that everything that needs to be mentioned is already mentioned, as long as we retain the incidents I added, which are all without a doubt --did I mention this? :-) --- notable. -The Gnome (talk) 11:18, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

P.S. I trust that you remain neutral and objective in this discussion about a Birmingham City player and that your many (and excellent) contributions to entries related to said football club do not affect your judgement at all. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 11:18, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

{outdent)This has nothing to do with "beautifying" a biography. Bowyer is notable in the WP sense because he's a footballer. Given that he is notable because of his job, then his non-footballing activities come into play. The article quite correctly includes well-referenced factual reports of the cannabis, McDonald's, Leeds nightclub, and Dyer incidents, certainly not glossed over.

But his former girlfriend's account of their final row is different in kind. The source you refer to takes up several pages of Sunday magazine investigating the contradictory aspects of Bowyer's character. Another part of it talks of the young Bowyer's social circle being "culturally diverse", and says how the mother of his best friend, a boy of Nigerian origin, "dismisses the notion that Bowyer was racially prejudiced". We can't cherry-pick one piece of illustrative material from such a source and list it as a fact on public record in the same way we can, and have, listed his court appearances or his footballing achievements. Struway2 (talk) 19:52, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

"100th" yellow card

Please see the Premier League website stats pages, at http://www.premierleague.com/page/Statistics/0,,12306,00.html, which lists Bowyer's yellow card count at 99. That figure is consistent with the references already in the article which give him 98 PL yellows at the end of 2010; the one received on 5 March was his first in 2011, see Soccerbase http://www.soccerbase.com/players/player.sd?player_id=870 . A piece on the Sports Illustrated website mentions the discrepancy, see http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/writers/peter_berlin/03/05/epl.notes/ . Given that reliable sources including the PL themselves suggest that he hasn't actually got 100 yellow cards yet, we shouldn't really be saying he has. cheers, Struway2 (talk) 10:17, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

I've done some research - it seems Bowyer DID receive his 100th booking in March, though one card was upgraded to a red. Therefore it's fine to say he received his 100th booking in March as this is notable though I don't think it should be in the lead.--Shakehandsman (talk) 21:53, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

If the standard method of counting yellow cards is to discount matches where two bookings resulted in a player being sent off, then it's original research for us to count them differently. But that does seem a better explanation for why some media sources reported his booking in March as his 100th, so I've reformulated your research as an informative footnote. Thanks, Struway2 (talk) 10:18, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Change to lead

My edit, that was reverted without a clear rationale is definitely better. The previous lead mixed up the player's playing and managerial career whereas the new version puts the key facts together and sharpens the lead up. If there is an ongoing objection I should welcome the rationale. 2A02:C7F:4481:8300:90DC:E235:5074:54B0 (talk) 14:15, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

It's definitely not better. Your changes have made the lead threadbare, when really it should be longer than it already was. The lead should start with the subject's claim to notability, i.e. being a professional football manager and former player, and then go into more detail in the following paragraph(s). Mattythewhite (talk) 14:44, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Certainly the phrase "Bowyer played for several English clubs including" needs to be changed since this implies that he played for other clubs than those listed whereas the list of clubs is comprehensive. 2A02:C7F:4481:8300:90DC:E235:5074:54B0 (talk) 15:10, 28 August 2019 (UTC)