1 August, 2024

Popular veteran’s mid-court grit runs in the family

Family time… Milford residents Lisa and Charli Foster both play in Netball North Harbour’s Premier 1 club competition, in Shore Rovers two top teams

Netball can these days be a mother-and-daughter tussle for Shore Rovers veteran Lisa Foster, who has clocked up a remarkable 30-odd years in the North Harbour premier grade.
The 47-year-old Milford resident, who has played 100 top-level games for Rovers and even more before that for the Commodores club, has in recent years played alongside her daughters Tayla and Charli.
Turning out for the Rovers 2 team in the top grade, she last month had the job of marking Charli, who was playing for Rovers 1, having just returned from duty with the Northern Marvels in the National Netball League (NNL).
Lisa is a popular personality at Netball North Harbour’s Barfoot & Thompson arena, where she has been a regular since her teens, only taking breaks from top grade for the births of her three children.
She first joined Commodores as a senior high-school student. Then, during her 13 years with Rovers, the area’s biggest club, she has both captained and coached Rovers 1.
“Quite a lot of people here have known Mum through netball,” says Charli. “They say you look exactly like your mum.”
Comparisons are also made with Tayla, who like Charli and Lisa played for Shore Rovers 1 and North Harbour representative sides, but now lives in Australia.
“I hope I play like mum,” says 21-year-old Charli. “We definitely have similar mindsets through sport – we’re very driven and like to be in control.”
All three Foster women are gritty mid-courters – the playmakers who do the most running in the game – making Lisa’s longevity all the more notable.
The daily gym-goer and relief daycare teacher says she has been lucky to have had only one serious injury in her time in the sport. “As long as I can play and it’s not to the detriment of the team, I’ll keep playing,” she says.
Charli says her step up to NNL – a feeder competition to the ANZ championship – was exciting and challenging, in both training and travelling around the country to play. “You have to turn up mentally,” she says. Play was “a lot more physical”.
Tayla, who is seven years older, made the Marvels herself in 2018 and 2019, but is not playing netball currently, having had a second baby.
When Lisa was a young stay-at-home mother, she found netball was a great way to get out of the house. “I’ve always used netball as my outlet. I’d have my hour or two away and I never stopped.”
She still loves getting together with teammates each week and letting off steam.
After all her years in action, “my body knows what to do,” she says.
But the odd calf niggle this season means for the first time she is less driven to be on court for the whole 60 minutes. “I don’t think I’ll play for ever,” she concedes.
She will continue her own “fitness journey”, however, with workouts, dog walks and supporting Charli’s progress.
“I hear your voice wherever you are in the stadium,” her daughter says with a laugh.
The family’s sporting focus is not limited to netball. All, including Lisa’s husband Joel and son Caleb, 24, have played touch for North Harbour. Joel is a national touch coach and Charli played for the Open New Zealand side against Australia in 2023.
Netball has now taken precedence for Charli, however. Growing up the two sports were complementary, but having made the Marvels on her third attempt, she says: “This year was a novice season and next year I’d like to cement myself.”
Going through Westlake Girls High School, Charli was a Year 11 member of the netball side that made the national secondary schools final in 2018.
She was later picked for the New Zealand Secondary Schools development camp, but no national team played in 2020, her last year at school, because of Covid. “That year has gone right out of my mind,” she says.
Now a first-year accountant after studying at Auckland University of Technology, Charli has gained resilience over the years.
Not getting picked for Rovers 1 at her first trial in the lost 2020 year – when Lisa last coached the side – was part of that process.
She won selection the following year (having previously turned out for Rovers 2) and has had three years with the team, playing alongside a former Westlake and New Zealand touch team-mate, Ellie Minton.
Charli says she probably plays a little more riskily than her mother, who controls tempo and reads the game particularly well.
Both play mainly at centre or wing attack. Lisa says Charli is a real “out there” third child, but adds: “I can remember being an emotional player when I was younger.”
They have learned to navigate the mother-daughter sporting relationship carefully.
When Charli first started playing premier grade – which Lisa says “isn’t always nice” – she kept a protective eye on the opposition targeting the youngster.
“Wing attacks cop it,” she says. But she says she has also been “very hard” on her daughters at times, because she had the confidence they could cope.
Charli’s take: “As much as I got smashed, I was figuring it out on the court.”
In advice for other sporting parents, Lisa says over the years she has avoided talking sport too much on the after-match car ride or at home. Sometimes, she knew her kids just needed space.
Charli says: “I’ve gotten pretty good at knowing when to have convos with my mum as my coach or Mum as my mum.”
Netball is definitely the sport they most enjoy. “It’s always just been the way of my life. I just love it,” Charli says.

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