Craig Andrew Foster AM (born 1969), nicknamed Fozzy or Fozz, is an Australian retired soccer player, human rights activist and sports analyst for the Stan streaming service in Australia.

[2][4] Foster holds a Postgraduate Diploma in Football Business and a Master in Sport Management degree from the Johan Cruyff Institute.

[3] He moved to Victorian club Sunshine George Cross in 1989 before returning to Sydney to play for Avala in the NSW Super League in 1992.

[10][non-primary source needed] Foster represented Australia at under-16 level, reaching the quarter finals at the 1985 FIFA U-16 World Championship in China.

[37][38][32] In 2007, Foster was invited to be the Australian representative to judge the Ballon d'Or, the highest award given to an individual soccer player.

[13] He works in a range of social programs, including Indigenous rights and self-determination; homelessness in Australia; climate change; and advocacy for refugees.

[15] Foster was vocal in campaigning on behalf of Bahraini footballer Hakeem al-Araibi, who was granted protection as a political refugee in Australia in 2014 but was detained upon arrival in Thailand in November 2018 while on his honeymoon with his wife owing to an Interpol red notice put out by Bahrain.

[48][non-primary source needed] After al-Araibi's release was secured, others tweeted nominations for Foster as Australian of the Year or even prime minister.

[13][49] Foster plays a prominent role in the 2023 documentary film The Defenders by Adelaide filmmaker Matthew Bate,[50] which tells the story the campaign to free al-Araibi from prison.

[citation needed] On 22 February 2019, Foster published an open letter to the Australian prime minister Scott Morrison and leader of the opposition, Bill Shorten, in The Sydney Morning Herald, in which, after thanking them for their assistance in helping to free al-Araibi, he addressed the issue of how Australia treats its asylum seekers.

He said "I have waited until after Hakeem was safely home [from Thailand] to explain that one of the reasons it was so difficult to garner international support was because of our own treatment of refugees.

He became the face of Amnesty Australia's "Game Over" (#GameOver) campaign in late 2019, which has been supported by high-profile sportspeople such as Liz Ellis, Benny Elias, Paul Roos, Ian Chappell, Lisa Sthalekar, Paul Wade, Frank Farina, Alex Tobin, Craig Moore; musician Jimmy Barnes, actors Bryan Brown and Anthony La Paglia musicians and many others.

[55][56] In October 2020, as part of the campaign, Foster and NRL star Sonny Bill Williams presented a petition containing more than 65,000 signatures to federal parliament, which called upon the government to take up New Zealand's longstanding (since 2013) offer to resettle refugees who had been held Australian offshore detention for many years.

He bemoaned the lack of good leadership on these issues, and said that the colonisation of Australia had been underpinned by racism, and is still present in policy and media coverage; that it is a "festering sore on the national psyche".

He has vocally supported the #PayUpFIFA campaign of the Human Rights Watch, which advocates for the payment of US$440 million for the affected families of the mistreated migrant workers.

[67] He has volunteered with Play for Lives (#PlayForLives), a response to the COVID-19 pandemic by sporting people and bodies, which began in Australia and expanded internationally.

He is a driving force behind "#RacismNotWelcome",[58] a grassroots campaign initiated the Addison Road Community Centre,[12] supported by local government associations across Australia.

[29][75] In 2021, Foster was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for significant service to multiculturalism, to human rights and refugee support organisations, and to football.