Lives in Cricket No 18 - FR Foster

Chapter Six Under the Southern Cross It had been a wearing, even manic season but six days after the Grand Hotel dinner Foster, Kinneir and Smith left for Australia. One imagines their desire for calm seas and a restful voyage. It is doubtful whether any of the Warwicks trio featured in the selectors’ plans at the season’s start. As the season unfolded – as it became apparent that Warwicks could take a place among the giants – speculation became rife. On 30 June the selectors decided to invite Foster, and C.B.Fry was named prospective captain. Other amateurs invited were P.F.Warner and Lancashire’s R.H.Spooner, while professionals Hobbs, Rhodes, Barnes and Strudwick were also asked. Then, at Fry’s suggestion, James Iremonger, Nottinghamshire’s experienced allrounder (who was never to play a Test) and the Essex pace bowler C.P.Buckenham were named. In July other places were confirmed; Jack Hearne, 20-years-old Middlesex allrounder was invited, as were Foster’s wicket-keeper Tiger Smith and opener Sep Kinneir. Neither had yet played Test cricket. Surrey’s Tom Pawley was named manager, but he accepted the position only when assured that the £170 he would lose as absent Surrey secretary would be matched by MCC. 42 Fry, citing his duties at T.S.Mercury – didn’t his wife run the place? – and Spooner then dropped out and the captaincy reverted to P.F.Warner, who immediately demanded that his wife accompany him and have her fare and expenses paid by MCC. Thankfully the demand was refused. With J.W.H.T.Douglas, the Essex skipper, strengthening the amateur contingent and Phil Mead, George Gunn, Joe Vine and Bill Hitch ( vice Buckenham) added to the professionals’ brigade – the last two at the suggestion of the amateurs – the party was complete. The send-off from Fenchurch Street Station on 29 September was enthusiastic, the platform so packed with well-wishers the players took thirty minutes to reach their carriages. However, the feeling of several self-styled ‘experts’ was that the team was not sufficiently strong. The party embarked from Tilbury on the Orient liner R.M.S.Orvieto . The weather was pretty good until they approached Naples when players who had played shipboard games and eaten heartily were suddenly unable to leave their cabins due to ‘mal de mer’. Further disappointment came when at Naples they were confined to the ship due to cholera in the city. They then wended their way to Taranto; again no-one was allowed ashore but 53 42 Looked at through twenty-first-century eyes it seems incredible he even had to ask.