RIP Frank Foster

[morty 339]

RIP Frank Foster 10 years Barrow coach 73-83 

[The Vet 200]

RIP Frank, legend of the club & the town 

[Dave W 180]

I know Tommy Dawes was the coach of the 1983 Lancashire Cup winning Barrow team, but Frank Foster was the man who laid the foundations for it. RIP Frank. 

[scrumhalf 104]

rip frank

[Town utd 87]

RIP Frank the hardest man in rugby league,great man.

[RL does what Sky says 1,346]

From an Oldham fan .....

Sad to hear that Frank Foster has passed away.

He signed for Oldham from Barrow in January 1972 and although he only played for the club for one and a half seasons he totally transformed their fortunes. At the time of his signing Oldham had that season only won six and drawn one of their 21 league games and were 28th in a one division set-up of 30 teams. However after his arrival they lost just one more out of 13 and that was in the last minute at Warrington and finished in 16th place.  The following season Oldham were top of the league in November and although they eventually finished 9th there has never been anyone who has had the same immediate impact on the club as he did.

One stand out memory ? Well, actually in a "friendly" match. The Great Britain team were due to go to the 1972 World Cup and played a warm-up game against Oldham at Watersheddings. Despite all the best forwards in the country being in the opposing pack (and Oldham's own International Bob Irving actually playing that night for GB), only one forward dominated the entire game - Frank Foster, who had a point to prove having been overlooked for the World Cup squad. Oldham actually beat Great Britain that night and with the Oldham crowd chanting "Foster for Britain" !

Frank Foster will obviously be a legend in Barrow but just to let you all know that he will always have such equal status in Oldham.

Thank you Frank for all you did.... great memories.

[Shipbuilder 106]

Great player, great coach, legend to the town and to the game of Rugby League.

RIP Frank

[HP Beans 17]

On 22/12/2019 at 18:04, RL does what Sky says said:

From an Oldham fan .....

Sad to hear that Frank Foster has passed away.

He signed for Oldham from Barrow in January 1972 and although he only played for the club for one and a half seasons he totally transformed their fortunes. At the time of his signing Oldham had that season only won six and drawn one of their 21 league games and were 28th in a one division set-up of 30 teams. However after his arrival they lost just one more out of 13 and that was in the last minute at Warrington and finished in 16th place.  The following season Oldham were top of the league in November and although they eventually finished 9th there has never been anyone who has had the same immediate impact on the club as he did.

One stand out memory ? Well, actually in a "friendly" match. The Great Britain team were due to go to the 1972 World Cup and played a warm-up game against Oldham at Watersheddings. Despite all the best forwards in the country being in the opposing pack (and Oldham's own International Bob Irving actually playing that night for GB), only one forward dominated the entire game - Frank Foster, who had a point to prove having been overlooked for the World Cup squad. Oldham actually beat Great Britain that night and with the Oldham crowd chanting "Foster for Britain" !

Frank Foster will obviously be a legend in Barrow but just to let you all know that he will always have such equal status in Oldham.

Thank you Frank for all you did.... great memories.

Love stories like that

[RL does what Sky says 1,346]

It might have already been arranged but it would be a lovely touch for the players of both Barrow and Oldham to observe a few moments silence in memory of Frank Foster before their friendly match on 5 January 2020 .... he will always be a legend throughout the history of both clubs.

In fact it was when Barrow played at home to Oldham on New Year's Day in 1972 that negotiations took place regarding Frank's possible transfer and which was then completed a couple of weeks later.

I always remember an article in the Oldham Chronicle by their reporter Roger Halstead after Frank had signed for Oldham. Roger recalled that after completing his match report that New Year's Day afternoon in Barrow he was leaving the ground and was surprised to see Frank Foster walking the other way, whereupon Frank said "Hiya Marra, you'll probably be seeing more of me in a few weeks time".

Frank Foster - not "one of" but THE hardest man ever to play Rugby League.

[the man 98]

We have arranged with the RFL for a minutes silence to be observed in memory of Frank.

Frank's teams are the ones that got me hooked. Probably my best season's memory was 1978/79 when we made all those signings from rugby union and but before Christmas could hardly win a game.

After Christmas we had a scrappy win in the Challenge cup against lower league York (10-7 I think) then beat New Hunslet and everything just clicked. We lost at Wakefield in the CC 1/4 final when we took a few thousand but in the league we started to beat everyone, alas not enough to avoid relegation when 4 went down

 

[RL does what Sky says 1,346]

7 hours ago, the man said:

We have arranged with the RFL for a minutes silence to be observed in memory of Frank.

Thank you. I have put a note about it on the Oldham forum.

[RL does what Sky says 1,346]

I was doing some research on the Oldham RL Heritage Trust website and found something which may interest many people in Barrow as it is about Frank Foster who died just a few weeks ago.

As has been said previously, Frank is not only a legend in Barrow but also in Oldham where he totally transformed the club's fortunes after signing from Barrow in early 1972.

At that time Oldham were attempting to be "progressive" and instead of a match day programme they produced a newspaper which supporters could have delivered to their house a couple of days prior to the game. One of these newspapers included a full page article on Frank Foster, even including a photo of his wife and children.

To view the article click onto the following link which will take you to the "Documents Archive" section of the Oldham RL Heritage Trust website ... https://orl-heritagetrust.org.uk/document-archive/

Once there type "Widnes" into the search box in the top right hand corner of that page.

Once the list of Oldham's games versus Widnes appear then scroll down to the game on 22 October 1972 and click onto "View" in the blue box on the right.

The match day newspaper will then appear.  Scroll down to page 4 for the article about Frank Foster.

[scrumhalf 104]

Frank john cunningham frankie jones and who? in the picture if you put barrow in the search box its a history lesson on barrow teams from the past excellent read

[RL does what Sky says 1,346]

2 hours ago, scrumhalf said:

Frank john cunningham frankie jones and who? in the picture if you put barrow in the search box its a history lesson on barrow teams from the past excellent read

Yes... good idea.  I never thought of suggesting to put Barrow in the search box. Glad it was of help for you.

[Keith Nutter 69]

22 hours ago, scrumhalf said:

Frank john cunningham frankie jones and who? in the picture if you put barrow in the search box its a history lesson on barrow teams from the past excellent read

I think the other may be Mick Murphy.

[Brookie 168]

On 27/12/2019 at 14:18, RL does what Sky says said:

It might have already been arranged but it would be a lovely touch for the players of both Barrow and Oldham to observe a few moments silence in memory of Frank Foster before their friendly match on 5 January 2020 .... he will always be a legend throughout the history of both clubs.

In fact it was when Barrow played at home to Oldham on New Year's Day in 1972 that negotiations took place regarding Frank's possible transfer and which was then completed a couple of weeks later.

I always remember an article in the Oldham Chronicle by their reporter Roger Halstead after Frank had signed for Oldham. Roger recalled that after completing his match report that New Year's Day afternoon in Barrow he was leaving the ground and was surprised to see Frank Foster walking the other way, whereupon Frank said "Hiya Marra, you'll probably be seeing more of me in a few weeks time".

Frank Foster - not "one of" but THE hardest man ever to play Rugby League.

Until he he took a pop at Brian McTigue, and came off second best. But still a hard man, and a hell of a nice guy

[RL does what Sky says 1,346]

52 minutes ago, Brookie said:

Until he he took a pop at Brian McTigue, and came off second best. But still a hard man, and a hell of a nice guy

Yes I'd prefer to watch those two rather than any combination of Fury v Wilder v Joshua.