The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus‎ . I doubt very much that further discussion will result in consensus. While there is little disagreement about which sources are available, there is wide disagreement about the quality and depth of the available sources, and whether we should be more concerned about the availability of multiple, less-than-in-depth sources vs. that a BLP requires strong sources. Policy would certainly lean heavily to the latter for controversial information, but that does not appear to be the case here. 78.26 (spin me / revolutions) 23:34, 21 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Robert Zebelyan[edit]

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Robert Zebelyan (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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Fails GNG and BIO. Unsourced except for promo stats links in EL. BEFORE showed nothing that meets SIGCOV addressing the subject directly and indepth.

BLPs need clearly IS RS with SIGCOV addressing the subject directly and indepth for both content and notability to avoid abuse per well known core policy (WP:V and WP:BLP) and guidelines (WP:BIO and WP:IS, WP:RS, WP:SIGCOV).  // Timothy :: talk  13:56, 5 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep per sources below which show notability. GiantSnowman 15:14, 6 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • The Armenian-language coverage is no better. The tert.am Q&A interview posted above is potentially useful, but contains so little independent reporting, it cannot count towards WP:SIGCOV. This blogpost actually sums up Zebelyan's career (he is one of 20 Armenian footballers who "didn't live up to expectations") in a way that helps me understand why I can't find any SIGCOV. Jogurney (talk) 21:55, 6 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • What new sources have you introduced beyond those listed above? I went back through the ones posted above (now added to the article), and the sportfiction.ru hosting of a Nezavisimaya Gazeta Q&A interview is the only one with independent reportage (2 paragraphs) of any significance. That said, I would need to see something else to believe the GNG could be met. Care to share what you think gets us there? Jogurney (talk) 13:34, 7 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • I wanted to clarify that Zebelyan has not made 200+ appearances isn fully top flights and second tiers of Soviet states; he played 12 matches in the Russian top division, 101 matches in the Russian second division, 9 matches in the Belarussian top division, and 11 matches in the Kazakh top division (really only 12 of these at an elite level). Jogurney (talk) 17:07, 7 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The majority of the sources are not club press releases and are by the news portals themselves. On top of the many many sources about him during his playing career, the fact that there are sources about him years after his retirement ([20], [21], [22] among others) show how notable he is in post Soviet football. The information on all the sources is enough for a relatively comprehensive footballer Wikipedia page, especially an Armenian player. On top of that, there are definitely also offline sources about him in Armenian and Russian. Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 04:07, 8 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
We've already been over the first two, which are primary and non-independent interviews (the second better than the first). The third source is a wordpress blog, why would you link that? JoelleJay (talk) 06:06, 8 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
If writing a comprehensive summary of pretty much his entire career (early life, youth club career, senior club career, youth international career, senior international career, post-playing career, style of play, and personal life) is "trivia", I don't know what isn't "trivia" in a Wikipedia biography. Also, most of the sources are clearly not routine - WP:ROUTINE states that routine coverage is things like "wedding announcements, sports scores, crime logs" etc. My other points in the previous statement above still stand, but at this point, let's agree to disagree. Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 04:42, 9 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
NOTNEWS states routine news coverage of announcements, events, sports, or celebrities, while sometimes useful, is not by itself a sufficient basis for inclusion of the subject of that coverage. This is also reflected in PRIMARYNEWS and in the sources used at PRIMARY. JoelleJay (talk) 04:55, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Firstly, its not like the sources don't have any secondary coverage (e.g. "the 22-year-old boy was noticed in Kuban, where he became the team's top scorer in the 2006 season and from where he was regularly called up to the Armenian national team. Moving next season to Khimki... seemed like a step forward, but at the peak of his abilities, Zebelyan decided on a desperate step, once again plunging into the abyss of the PFL in the hope of reviving the Sochi Zhemchuzhina. Alas, the new project, despite a promising start, soon sank into oblivion", "the forward Robert Zebelyan, quite well-known in the post-Soviet space" etc). Secondly, every deletion editor's entire arguments is basically repeating "everything is routine" (clearly not true) or "deletion because the "law" said so" (Wikipedia:Wikilawyering) without thinking about why the "law" exists in the first place... the reason the secondary source "law" exists is objectivity, which this article does anyways... if a fair amount of independent, reliable sources, primary or secondary, can produce an objective factual decent sized article about a clear topic of interest, there's no logical reason it should be deleted at all (Wikipedia is supposed to be a source of knowledge, and this article is a "yes" to Wikipedia:The one question). Lastly, For some backwards reason the focus is always on deletion rather than improvement, (but, I hear you say, isn't the whole point of editing Wikipedia to delete others articles?) but I spent hours doing a WP:HEY and vastly expanded the article with the sources. WP:HEY states that it can be "invoked during deletion discussions to point out that an article has been significantly improved since it was nominated for deletion". As one user stated in another deletion discussion, "expansion... renders the above WP:WIKILAWYERING a moot point". Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 08:08, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Having some secondary coverage is not sufficient for a source to count towards GNG. And, as explained to you several times, "the forward Robert Zebelyan, quite well-known in the post-Soviet space" comes from a press release, not that a single sentence is worth anything to GNG.
Part of objectivity is maintaining appropriate weight and proportion in an article. Each item derived from routine media is (basically by definition) a WP:MINORASPECT and thus is not encyclopedic to include in the body of an article, which is part of why it doesn't contribute to notability. An article that merely states which teams a subject played for and when, and their basic stats, is just prosifying details from the infobox without adding context from secondary independent RS about why those things are important. Your "expansion" is almost entirely "Zebelyan signed for [team] in [year]" supplemented with non-independently-sourced content: a spot check reveals almost every single fact in the "club career" section is sourced directly to quotes from the subject or affiliates or to press releases. That is not acceptable for any biography, let alone a BLP. JoelleJay (talk) 21:12, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
There's some real irony in a staunch supporter of Wikipedia:SNG for another topic where the biography doesn't need to meet WP:GNG being the staunchest advocate of WP:GNG for any other biography besides those ones... (Like I've said before, I support article creation on all topics, but the double standard is very frustrating). Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 08:08, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
What are you talking about? NPROF? If you follow that guideline at all you would see that I am not a "staunch supporter" whatsoever, however unlike some sports project members I do follow the community consensus on the status and spirit of the guideline and its criteria at AfDs rather than constantly attempting to disrupt its implementation just because I disagree with it. JoelleJay (talk) 21:16, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The sources identified so far are generally not independent of the subject (lots of quote from Zebelyan himself, plenty of club press releases), and those that are independent do not contain in-depth coverage of the subject. Read the coverage you cite above - he didn't achieve success with the Armenia national football team, and he didn't achieve success in the Russian Premier League (either with Kuban or Khimki). He did well in two of his seasons in the Russian second division, but little else. If we follow the spirit but not the letter of the notability guidelines, I don't think most editors would agree that Zebelyan did enough in his career to be notable without the SIRS coverage we normally require. Jogurney (talk) 16:47, 11 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I never said primary and non-independent sources couldn't be used, but as our policies say an article cannot be based on them. Sportsperson articles are generally very poor in this regard, and Harnik is no exception (although he at least has relatively substantive SIRS articles like this from which to draw independent material). That many sports editors completely ignore content P&Gs is not surprising, but if an article can be written based on SIGCOV and sub-SIGCOV non-routine SIRS then the current status of the page is just a step in the "eventualism" process and can be fixed through editing. JoelleJay (talk) 17:38, 11 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Again, the lack of WP:COMMONSENSE is alarming... deletion editors are so stuck in their own WP:WIKILAWYERING (they are just repeating "our policies say" again and again, like the statement above) that they completely forget the point of the "laws" and Wikipedia itself. The main reason the "laws" were even made to begin with was to combat vandalism, spam, unambiguous self-promotion/advertising, none of which this comprehensive article about a clear topic of interest has, and the main reason Wikipedia was even made to begin with was to be a permanent place of knowledge for topics of interest to people. On top of that, there is a clear difference between a player like e.g. Tiago Quintal or Slaheddine Sebti (both of whom I didn't vote to keep) and a seasoned Armenian international with elite level experience... Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines and Wikipedia:The rules are principles state "Use common sense in interpreting and applying policies and guidelines; rules have... exceptions" and "They [the "laws"] must be understood in context, using... common sense and discretion". Again, this article is not completely based on primary coverage (see my statements providing a decent amount of examples above), and there is "context from secondary independent RS" supported by secondary coverage in the article. As for the parts that cite primary coverage, they are clearly factual (.g. "Born in Sochi, Soviet Union, Zebelyan played different sports as a child, including tennis, before focusing more on football"), and former Soviet states tend to have interviews as one of the highest forms of sports coverage compared to other countries (again, context), as shown by significant Soviet league players like Almaz Chokmorov, Valery Reinhold, Leanid Harai, Vladimir Bychek, Viktor Razumovskiy, and Yuri Gladkikh not to mention others. Regarding Zebelyan's achievements (even then, my point is not even about his achievements, he is clearly a topic of interest that warrants a Wikipedia page - for instance, he has Wikipedia pages in 9 languages), he played at at an "elite level" (Jogurney's words, also Russia Premier League is considered a top 10 league in Europe), he was clearly considered an Armenian prospect and an important player in the Russian pro leagues. Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 18:37, 11 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Are you essentially asking us to consider WP:IAR? It's a fair argument. I haven't contributed to this discussion but I'm interested to see how it develops. The article's depth is impressive considering the lack of depth in the coverage. Spiderone(Talk to Spider) 19:18, 11 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't call a prose list of the teams he played for "deep"... One could achieve the same article length for a player who bounced around multiple semi-pro teams and gave a couple interviews. JoelleJay (talk) 22:28, 11 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Even without the primary sources, here is purely secondary coverage, many of which has information not in an infobox ... keep in mind this is not including the primary sources which also provide objective, factual information:

"the 22-year-old boy was noticed in Kuban, where he became the team's top scorer in the 2006 season and from where he was regularly called up to the Armenian national team. Moving next season to Khimki... seemed like a step forward, but at the peak of his abilities, Zebelyan decided on a desperate step, once again plunging into the abyss of the PFL in the hope of reviving the Sochi Zhemchuzhina. Alas, the new project, despite a promising start, soon sank into oblivion", "In the mid-2000s, Zebelian was considered the terror of all teams of the 1st league of Russia. Having been recognized as the best scorer, Zebelyan also received an invitation from the Armenian national team. Unfortunately, Zebelyan could not stand out at least once during the 7 games he played in the team. And the peak of failures was in 2007. in autumn, it was the match against the Serbian national team, where Zebelyan became one of the anti-heroes of the game together with Ara Hakobyan. Having lost his place in the national team, he could not strengthen himself in Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan and is now in search of a new team", "Two Sochi footballers - Manuk Kakosyan and Robert Zebelyan - are talking... the Sochi Zhemchuzhina was twice at the peak of Russian fame: in 1998, it briefly climbed to second place in the major leagues, and ten years later it hit Moscow with a huge banner “We abandoned Beckham” and an invitation from coach Cherchesov... Robert Zebelyan, the forward of the team that disdained Beckham, sells real estate", "On January 21, Robert Zebelyan, a former player of the Armenian national football team, underwent an operation in Yerevan. The intervertebral hernia operation was successful, and the football player went to his native Sochi for rehabilitation. Zebelyan played for the last time as part of the Armenian national team in the match against Russia in Yerevan. 2011 since July, he has been playing in "Tobol" of Kazakhstan", "the forward Robert Zebelyan, quite well-known in the post-Soviet space" (I know its from the club, but they ' clearly wouldn't be saying this about any player...), "Robert Zebelyan, the striker of the Armenian national team and "Dynamo" of Minsk, has recently participated very little in his team's matches, but during the preparatory phase and in the first matches of the Belarusian championship, he played an effective game" , "On Saturday, the fans of Minsk "Dynamo" finally felt relieved. First, the team scored after a goalless streak of 403 minutes. Secondly, she won after four rounds since the last victory. Thirdly, it dispelled (so far) the clouds that had already gathered over Oleg Vasilenko. Although minimal, but such a pleasant victory became possible thanks to the goal of the Armenian striker Robert ZEBELYAN... who is still settling in the capital of Belarus", "In 2006, Robert Zebelyan became the most productive player in the first division, scoring 23 goals for Kuban. Now Robert mainly comes on as a substitute in Baltika"...

As for the primary sources, unless you think he is somehow lying or has an "agenda" (both of which clearly aren't true) when he says, among other examples, that he "played different sports as a child, including tennis, before focusing more on football" or that he "initially operated as a defender [as a youth player] before starting to operate as a striker", or "Kuban Krasnodar were initially reluctant to let him play for the Armenia national football team due to the congestion of fixtures in the Russian second tier but they eventually let represent Armenia internationally" (he said this in interviews, and a Kuban Krasnodar official verified it in a separate interview by a separate source), or "However, during the 2007 season, he made significantly less appearances for Kuban Krasnodar due to the manager (Pavlo Yakovenko) trusting him less as the 2007 season began, even after he scored during preseason friendlies" (the journalist interviewing Zebelyan for eurofootball essentially said this) or "Zebelyan's father had to buy his transfer rights so he could play for Zhemchuzhina Sochi" (the journalist asking Zebelyan about this knew about this and was aware of this already, and Zebelyan merely confirmed it) or "Zebelyan has a wife and son", there is no logical reason why these primary sources can't be used for these objective, factual statements that provide background information and can't be found in an infobox (again, context and common sense, its not as if I wrote in the article something based on a quote from him like "Upon arrival to Kuban Krasnodar, the manager told him "you're not part of my plans" ). Another aspect is that former Soviet states tend to have interviews as one of the highest forms of sports coverage compared to other countries like e.g. Indonesia and Vietnam, which tend to have much less straight-up interviews in sports coverage (again, context), as shown by significant Soviet league players like Almaz Chokmorov, Valery Reinhold, Leanid Harai, Vladimir Bychek, Viktor Razumovskiy, and Yuri Gladkikh not to mention others.

I've said it before and I'll say it again... there is not much WP:COMMONSENSE from the deletion side who are missing the point/bigger picture... the main reason the "policy "requirements" were even made to begin with was to combat vandalism, spam, unambiguous self-promotion/advertising, and false information, clearly none of which this comprehensive, factual, objective article about a clear topic of interest has, even with these primary sources, and the main reason Wikipedia was even made to begin with was to be a permanent place of knowledge for topics of interest to people.

On top of that, the fact that, years after his retirement, third party news portals are conducting in-depth interviews of him that go through his entire career, early life, post-playing career etc, show that he is clearly a topic of interest to people and that he was a significant figure in Russian pro league football (not to mention an Armenian prospect).

The entire time I'm using effort to try to improve the article while deletionists are using all their effort to delete this comprehensive article about a clear topic of interest through being pedantic and WP:WIKILAWYERING. (Maybe I'm wrong though... maybe the entire point of editing Wikipedia is deleting others hard work through being pedantic and WP:WIKILAWYERING...).

Using common sense, there is a clear difference between a player like e.g. Tiago Quintal or Slaheddine Sebti (both of whom I didn't vote to keep) and Zebelyan, a seasoned Armenian international with "elite level" (Jogurney's words) experience (Zebelyan plauyed in Russian Premier League, which is regarded as top 10 league in Europe).

Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines and Wikipedia:The rules are principles clearly state "Use common sense in interpreting and applying policies and guidelines; rules have... exceptions" and "They [the "laws"] must be understood in context, using... common sense and discretion".

Furthermore, many times the pro deletion editors like JoelleJay have gave false statements about the article, here are two examples among others by them (others examples explained in my other statements above) -

First example:

Their "Source analysis" of 9: "a routine post-match interview that does not contain any of the info [in the Wikipedia page] it's supposed to support" (the Wikipedia page says "In 2007, he signed for Khimki, where he mainly appeared as a substitute"). However, the journalist author of the source, (also the source is not merely routine), writes in the source, "In 2006, Robert Zebelyan became the most productive player in the first division, scoring 23 goals for Kuban. Now Robert mainly comes on as a substitute in Baltika"

Second example:

Their claim that the article is just "details from the infobox without adding context": Just looking at the first paragraph alone, it states that "Zebelyan scored 23 goals for Kuban Krasnodar, becoming the club's top scorer that season and one of the top scorers of the league that season. However, during the 2007 season, he made significantly less appearances for Kuban Krasnodar due to the manager (Pavlo Yakovenko) trusting him less as the 2007 season began, even after he scored during preseason friendlies. Kuban Krasnodar were initially reluctant to let him play for the Armenia national football team due to the congestion of fixtures in the Russian second tier but they eventually let represent Armenia internationally. During the middle of the 2000s, Zebelyan was considered a consistent goalscoring threat in the Russian second tier.", etc etc among other examples, most of which aren't found in an infobox... I also added context with references (besides above and other examples) like "His first stint for Zhemchuzhina Sochi was only a few years after the club's only spell in the Russian Premier League", "Zebelyan dropped a division to return to Zhemchuzhina Sochi with the aim of resurrecting the club's fortunes, but the club dissolved a few seasons later", "He scored his first goal for Dinamo Minsk during a 1–0 win over Dnepr, the club's first win in four matches and the first goal his team scored after a goalless streak of 403 minutes, and temporarily eased the pressure on then Dinamo Minsk manager Oleg Vasilenko", "In 2008, Zebelyan signed for Baltika Kaliningrad, where he wore the unusual number ninety-nine on his jersey, (the journalist for championat.com wrote that the number was unusual) etc etc among other examples.

Since I doubt you (JoelleJay) will ever change your mind... lets just agree to disagree and leave it to the rest of the community to come to consensus... Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 07:30, 13 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

POLICY: Exercise extreme caution in using primary sources. [material from the subject] may be used as a source only if: it is not unduly self-serving; it does not involve claims about third parties; it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the subject; there is no reasonable doubt as to its authenticity; and the article is not based primarily on such sources.
POLICY: Secondary or tertiary sources are needed to establish the topic's notability. Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them.
POLICY: To provide encyclopedic value, data should be put in context with explanations referenced to independent sources. As explained in § Encyclopedic content above, merely being true, or even verifiable, does not automatically make something suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia
POLICY: the great majority of any article must be drawn from independent sources.
NBIO: Primary sources may be used to support content in an article, but they do not contribute toward proving the notability of a subject.
N: Independent sources are also needed to guarantee a neutral article can be written
It does not matter that primary/non-independent sources are factual and verifiable or that they provide helpful context. Articles cannot be based on them; they have to be a minority of the content.
1.

Their "Source analysis" of 9: "a routine post-match interview that does not contain any of the info [in the Wikipedia page] it's supposed to support" (the Wikipedia page says "In 2007, he signed for Khimki, where he mainly appeared as a substitute"). However, the journalist author of the source, (also the source is not merely routine), writes in the source, "In 2006, Robert Zebelyan became the most productive player in the first division, scoring 23 goals for Kuban. Now Robert mainly comes on as a substitute in Baltika"

That source does not say anything about him playing for Khimki.
2.

Their claim that the article is just "details from the infobox without adding context"

I specifically said Your "expansion" is almost entirely "Zebelyan signed for [team] in [year]" supplemented with non-independently-sourced content. That is an objective fact: the vast majority of the article comes directly from quotes from the subject.

Even without the primary sources, here is purely secondary coverage,

The plurality of the content you quote comes from the source that Jogurney and I have both pointed out to you is a blog. Claiming it as an example of secondary coverage is deliberately misleading since it is not RS! Another couple large chunks of the quoted "coverage" only contain a combined total of <35 words that are actually directly on Zebelyan. You also still included the quote from the club about him that obviously doesn't count toward SIGCOV. The remaining 4 sources amount to the sole non-trivial piece of coverage, which nevertheless is only 3 sentences; another 3 sentences distributed across 2 sources; and a routine injury announcement almost certainly derived from a press release. JoelleJay (talk) 23:19, 13 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Please stop WP:BLUDGEONing the process with your WP:WALLSOFTEXT. You’ve already made your point. Many editors disagree with your interpretation of policy. Frank Anchor 23:33, 13 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Needs more assessments of the sources. Das osmnezz, if you continue to WP:BLUDGEON this discussion with walls of texts, you may be blocked from contributing to it further, and such contributions will almost certainly be disregarded by the closer.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 09:35, 13 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Sources look ok-ish, it's generally more than what we have for other athletes. Oaktree b (talk) 15:15, 13 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
As Frank Anchor essentially stated above, you have been WP:BLUDGEONING the same pedantic point (WP:WIKILAWYERING) over and over to my various points above and that lots of editors disagree with your interpretation (as shown by the keep votes above). For the final time, how about we agree to disagree and leave it to the rest of the community to come to consensus... Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 07:14, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Das osmnezz Judging from your walls of text above, I'm not sure you are in the best position of accusing other editors of WP:BLUDGEONING and WP:WIKILAWYERING. Alvaldi (talk) 08:43, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Frank Anchor above was the first to accuse them of bludgeoning, but anyways, WP:BLUDGEONING is "making the same argument/point (in this case, a pedantic point - WP:WIKILAWYERING) over and over, to different people", which is exactly what they are doing, while I use various arguments using WP:COMMONSENSE. We can agree to disagree and leave it to others. Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 09:00, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I should clarify that both JoelleJay and Das osmnezz have bludgeoned the process by attempt[ing] to force their point of view by the sheer volume of comments, such as contradicting every viewpoint that is different from their own. Frank Anchor 13:22, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not reading your walls of text, keep it short or please stop badgering people here. Oaktree b (talk) 11:59, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
? My comment is just 4 lines on my screen. The even shorter version is: out of the 500 words claimed to be "secondary coverage" above, about half are from a blog or a club press release or don't contain any coverage of Zebelyan. The remainder are distributed across six mostly primary and/or routine sources: 40 words on average. JoelleJay (talk) 13:26, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
So throughout all of the sources, there are several sentences of significant, independent coverage. Per WP:NBIO, If the depth of coverage in any given source is not substantial, then multiple independent sources may be combined to demonstrate notability. As you allude to in your response to me, several sources have small amounts of significant, independent coverage. These can be cobbled together to allow Mr. Zebelyan' to be considered notable. Frank Anchor 14:00, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I do not agree that any of the coverage is significant or even substantial, and anyway most of the sources are primary and/or routine match recaps, injury announcements, or transfer/signing coverage containing the typical 2–5 sentences of career background that accompany such articles, which the community (including some keep !voters here, pre NSPORTS2022) has long dismissed as insufficient to count towards notability. JoelleJay (talk) 16:40, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think its BLUDGEONING to ask about the big picture. Although others (who have discussed the sources), and I think it meets GNG, using WP:COMMONSENSE: even if article "based on" primary, the secondary source "law" exists merely to ensure what article is already: comprehensive, objective, factual and clear topic of interest, no deletion reason. Das osmnezz (talk) 16:37, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
even if article "based on" primary, the secondary source "law" exists merely to ensure what this article already is: comprehensive, objective, factual and a clear topic of interest, no deletion reason The subject is not an objective source on themselves, and primary sources cannot be evaluated for proportionality, so you have no basis for the claim that the article is any of those things. And anyway the secondary coverage requirement does not exist "merely to ensure" an article has those properties: I quoted three separate P&Gs that say primary sources do not establish a topic's notability. You are also completely ignoring the policy that the great majority of any article must be drawn from independent sources and that a description of isolated events, quotes, criticisms, or news reports related to one subject may be verifiable and impartial, but still disproportionate to their overall significance to the article topic. This is a concern especially for recent events that may be in the news (a policy that is non-negotiable, and the principles upon which it is based cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus, not to mention NOTNEWS and INDISCRIMINATE. JoelleJay (talk) 17:33, 14 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
As per WP:RAP, WP:5p, WP:POL, no guideline is "non-negotiable" and "cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus". Whatever your legalese/pedantic objectivity stance, using WP:COMMONSENSE, unless you think they are lying/have agenda, statements from the subject like "I played different sports as a child, including tennis, before focusing more on football" or "I initially operated as a defender [as a youth player] before starting to operate as a striker" etc are all clearly objective and factual, so even if this article was completely based on primary (which many editors and I refute), there's no reason why in these situations an article can't be based on primary sources.Wikipedia is not a bureacruacy. Whatever your legalese/pedantic notability stance, using WP:COMMONSENSE, the fact that, years after his retirement, third-party portals are giving in-depth interviews of him combined with lots of coverage during his career, secondary or primary, many of which went into his early life, entire career etc, clearly show notability. As one user said, deletionists "have their noses so far into the policies that they can only see them in black and white... there is color, nuance, and even gray areas... Our policies... are not supposed to be rigid". For the last time, lets agree to disagree and leave it to others. Thanks, Das osmnezz (talk) 08:05, 15 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Both you (Das) and Joelle need to stop it and let the community decide what's best here. BeanieFan11 (talk) 14:37, 15 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
is non-negotiable, and the principles upon which it is based cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus is directly from the policy NPOV. If you have problems with it, take it to VPP. JoelleJay (talk) 18:23, 15 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
In this case the disruptive editor has already been warned to stop in the relisting comment by an admin, but they have continued (see page history). These bludgeoning walls of text are making any close determination difficult to impossible and is disruptive. Admins need to address this. How anyone is supposed to make heads or tails of this discussion is beyond me.  // Timothy :: talk  13:55, 15 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 1. "Robert Zabelyan: I think we'll make a lot of noise in the Belarusian Championship". pressball.by.
A promotional blog post sourced from the team. Fails WP:IS, WP:RS 2. ^Jump up to:a b "INTRODUCING THE TEAM'S BEST SCORE POINT".
States: "The leader of the first team, Manuk Kakosyan, works in Adler as the director of a sports complex, and Robert Zebelyan, the forward of the team that disdained Beckham, sells real estate." Fails WP:SIGCOV 3. ^Jump up to:a b c ""AFTER GOING TO THE FNL THERE WAS A BANQUET WITH VIAGRA AND KSENIYA SOBCHAK". WHAT HAPPENED IN THE CITY WHERE THE RUSSIA TEAM PLAYED" . matchtv.ru.
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 4. ^ Jump up to:a b "Robert Zebelian: "I don't know why I don't get into the first team of Kuban"". euro-football.ru.
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 5. ^Jump up to:a b c d "Robert Zebelian: I hurried with leaving Kuban". sportfiction.ru
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 6. ^Jump up to:a b "Robert Zebelian: "In Zhemchuzhina I played with Ruslan Baltiev"". sports.kz.
Interview with source connected to player and team. Fails WP:IS 7. ^ "Chairman of the board of directors of Kuban: "Zebelyan received a portion of confidence in the Armenian national team"". armenia-online.ru.
Blog post with one paragraph. Fails WP:RS, WP:SIGCOV 8. ^ Jump up to:a b "20 Armenian football players who did not live up to expectations".
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 9. ^Jump up to:a b "Zebelyan: first lap played very badly". championat.com.
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 10. ^Jump up to:a b "Robert Zebelyan. I underwent an operation in Yerevan on the advice of Roman Berezovsky.news.am.
Routine article/blog about a game. States "Robert Zebelyan, was alone against the goalkeeper of our national team" Fails WP:RS, WP:SIGCOV 11. ^ "Robert Zebelyan upset Roman Berezovsky" . aysor.am
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 12. ^Jump up to:a b "Robert Zebelyan. I want to move to another club in the summer.tert.am Archived fromthe originalon April 7, 2023. Retrieved 7 April 2023.
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 13. ^Jump up to:a b "Robert Zebelyan: every year Oleg Vasilenko becomes a more mature mentor". pressball.by.
Interview with subject. Contain very brief background. Fails WP:SIGCOV 14. ^ "Robert Zebelyan: "I will join the Armenian national team, but only in a year"". regnum.ru.
Promotional Question and Answer style interview. Fails WP:IS. Interviews do not make a subject notable 15. ^ Jump up to:a b "Robert Zebelyan: Tobol is a team with traditions". sports.kz
Interview with subject. Contain very brief background. Fails WP:SIGCOV 16. ^ "Robert Zebelian: I was 90% sure that I would play for the national team" . yuga.ru.
Interview with subject. Contain very brief background about a game. Fails WP:SIGCOV 17. ^ "Robert Zebelian: Armenia national team suffered from UEFA verdict" . aze.az.
Routine sports story about player being called up. Routine, nothing SIGCOV and the source for the article is the coach of the team. Fails WP:IS, WP:SIGCOV 18. ^ "Zebelyan to be called up for match with Russia" . sport-express.ru
  • Most of the sources are promotional interviews, mainly question and answer style interviews. These all fail WP:IS, WP:COISOURCE. Guideline states, "Non-independent sources may not be used to establish notability." None of these can be considered when evaluating a subjects notability.
  • There are two blog style posts that fail WP:RS
  • The remaining are brief mentions failing WP:SIGCOV.
  • The spam keep refs simply serve to show that the subject is not notable.
  • The Keep arguments above are either "Me too" votes or points that fall outside of policy and guidelines, ignore the requirements of BLP which states, "Be very firm about the use of high-quality sources"', and openly reject the recent consensus regarding the change to NSPORTS.
Article fails notability requirements.
The disruption in this article needs to be addressed.  // Timothy :: talk  14:44, 15 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I see brief mentions of coverage in 3, 14, 16, and 17. Probably more if I have a more thorough look through. Per WP:NBIO, If the depth of coverage in any given source is not substantial, then multiple independent sources may be combined to demonstrate notability. This source analysis therefore solidifies my “keep” vote. Frank Anchor 23:36, 18 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
3 has almost zero secondary commentary. 14 has less than one full independent sentence on him. 16 is one sentence in a report directly from the FC Kuban website (the non-quote material is churnalized too), so fails independence. 17 is less than a sentence ("Forward of the Armenian national football team Robert Zebelyan, who recently replaced Krasnodar Kuban with Khimki near Moscow") prefacing a routine interview. Come on. JoelleJay (talk) 03:16, 19 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the catch on 16 only, as I missed the reference to the Kuban site. However, the remaining small bits and pieces referenced by JoelleJay and TimothyBlue combine to be enough for a pass of NBIO. Frank Anchor 12:22, 20 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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