Lives in Cricket No 18 - FR Foster

the cardboard expressions and serious faces Foster seems to have an almost child-like, but certainly genuine smile. An omen? This was apparently asked of Warner when he saw the photograph and he replied Foster would one day captain England. Unfortunately a 40 mph collision with a lamp standard in 1915, right leg stiffly extended to save himself from being killed, ruined any hopes of that. Finally we cannot leave the 1911/12 tour without mention of Foster’s ‘affair’, not with the mysterious Margaret, with whom he struck up a shipboard liaison, but with six-year-old Betty, daughter of Pelham Warner. She quickly took to the easy-going Foster and followed him around throughout the tour. No-one could explain the soubriquet ‘porcupine’ which she gave Foster as he carried her teddy-bear collection around Australia. Foster said in Cricket Memories : We were great pals, Betty and I, and for some unknown reason she nicknamed me ‘porcupine’. 47 We loved each other very dearly, and were always playing together at some game or other. Just before I went into bat in the Second Test, Betty called out to me from her seat in the stand, ‘Stick your bristles out porcupine, and show these kangaroos what my porcupine can do’. Under the Southern Cross 65 Under the eucalypts in a Melbourne Park. The MCC team which toured Australia in 1911/12. Standing (l to r): S.Kinneir, E.J.Smith (wk), F.E.Woolley, S.F.Barnes, J.Iremonger, R.C.Campbell (scorer), J.Vine, H.Strudwick (wk). Seated: W.Rhodes, J.W.H.T.Douglas, P.F.Warner (capt), F.R.Foster, T.E.Pawley (manager), J.B.Hobbs, G.Gunn. On the ground: J.W.Hearne, J.W.Hitch. 47 Foster later claimed it had been explained to him by somebody, but it was ‘dead secret’.