Talk:List of German football transfers summer 2020

Format

Why does this article use such a stupid format? When you list every transfer by club, you end up duplicating a lot of info. Every transfer involving two clubs in the top two divisions of German football is duplicated, and there's also no info about the fees paid. If you follow the format at List of English football transfers summer 2020, you get a lot more info in less space. – PeeJay 10:19, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

Some civility here please, PeeJay. Opening with "this format is stupid" is not particularly conducive to constructive discussion. What this format does that the English list doesn't is meaningful grouping. With most lists this long, few readers will be interested in the whole thing. Grouping transfers by club allows readers to easily find the parts of the list that they're actually interested in, and provides context that you can't get with a chronological list. I suspect for exactly these reasons, we see similar formats employed by other publications. Notably Transfermarkt, whose primary focus is football transfers, and the official list from Bundesliga.de both use similar formats. The lack of fees in this list is down to the fact that non-disclosure is the norm in German football. Most discussions of fees within the scope of this list are speculative and not verifiable in reliable sources. Sir Sputnik (talk) 16:50, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

I don't see how my comment was uncivil, I wasn't calling any editors stupid, just expressing my opinion that I think the format of the article is stupid. You're right that fees are mostly undisclosed nowadays, which isn't a phenomenon restricted to German football. Nevertheless, I'm sure some are available, particularly in the case of free transfers. I also think if anyone wanted to look at a particular club's transfers, there should be a season article for that club that includes a list of the transfers they made. This type of article is supposed to be an overview of the transfer window where all the transfers are presented chronologically. If the format from the English series of these articles were used, there would even be a sortable table that allowed readers to group transfers involving the same club together. Surely that would make more sense? – PeeJay 19:45, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

Namecalling of this sort, whether directed at a person or not, is uncivil. It comes across as suggesting that you think anyone who prefers this format is stupid, whether you intended that meaning or not. At best, it adds nothing to the discussion, since "I don't like it" is never a valid argument. The existence of club season articles is not a given, especially for lower division clubs, and is not particularly relevant. Just because content is duplicated elsewhere, does not mean we should be obscuring relevant context through formatting. Sorting does not address this shortcoming of the English list format, since you can only ever get incoming or outgoing transfers for a particular club together, but not all of them. Not to mention that the separation of transfers and loans means you can't even get that. With the scope of this article defined by clubs involved in the transfers in question, I would expect this article provide an overview of the year-on-year change in relevant clubs' squad composition. A chronological listing makes that impossible. Sir Sputnik (talk) 17:02, 20 August 2020 (UTC)