Foley was reluctant to delve too deep into the jargonistic world of farming but emphasised a drizzle, akin to the one yesterday, would vex clodhoppers more than allay fears of a prolonged drought.
The light falls of precipitation tend to amplify the effects of parasites and trigger off infectious diseases.
Frankly farmers need two weeks of yesterday to bring back smiles to their faces.
Without trivialising the impact of droughts, was Foley keen to pay a token levy, almost in a pagan harvesting ritual sort of way, at the altar of the rain gods?
"Yes, two test matches in a row will do it?" he said with a laugh.
"The ground water will be recharged and the grass will turn green and start growing again."
He said farmers religiously start tracking the weather forecast amid teasers, such as the cricket internationals here, but, generally, they tend to turn to despair.
"That almost happened today because now there is that result so they tend to play around quite a bit with the forecasts," Foley said.
The blow dryers, super soppers and rakes were out yesterday as head groundsman Phil Stoyanoff and his merry men went about their business for several false starts.
The McLean Park faithful did fret a little but some just got into the frothy stuff and hot chips with the hills of Havelock North in view.
It was a false dawn for cricket.
