Meet the Team

There will be a team of eight volunteers travelling to Rwanda. The team is made up from a healthy mixture of new and returning volunteers all of who are keen to get started. Once again we will be based in Kigali but are looking forward to making the journey North to Ruthengeri and South to Butare.

Carl Ferguson (Project Leader)

Since its inception CWB has achieved amazing things, and although this is my first tour, I am very excited and honoured to be continuing their work on HIV and AIDS awareness in Rwanda. Cricket itself is a huge passion of mine and I play, having done so for 21 years, for Flitwick CC (‘The Mighty Otters’) in Bedfordshire. I have also captained the club for 5 seasons and I am hoping that I can draw on some of my previous experiences of captaincy in helping with the coordination of the trip. Away from cricket I am heavily into the arts, most other sports and like to think of myself as energetic, determined and always up for a challenge. This is perhaps best demonstrated by having previously completed 8 London Marathons…Although at the last attempt I was shamefully beaten by Tinky Winky from the Teletubbies which has since prompted my retirement from the event!

Michael Griggs (Tutor)

I am the ECB tutor in the team, and this adventure in Rwanda will be my third trip on behalf of Cricket Without Boundaries – I undertook a tour of duty to Botswana in 2009 with the charity, and then to the same destination again a year later. I have extensive cricket coaching and tutoring experience in the UK, and have also coached cricket in Sri Lanka, New Zealand and Australia over the past 10 years. I can also boast that I have selected an Ashes-winning team! (I held the post of ECB Chairman of Selectors for the England womens team from 2003 to 2008.) Recently, I returned from a year teaching English in Moscow, and I am delighted to be representing CWB once again, especially somewhere rather warmer than what I have experienced recently…

Kevin Key

This will be my third trip out to Rwanda with CWB, having previously been on projects in Autumn 2008 & 2010. The way in which CWB do a fantastic job in using cricket to teach HIV/AIDS awareness messages is the reason not only me but many others return, and also to see the impact the messages and the coaching have had on the communities involved.
 
I am employed as a sports coach at Ocklynge Junior School (which is the largest junior school in Europe, with 840 children, so I am used to coping with large groups of children) were I coach Football and Cricket and have Level 2 coaching certificates in both sports. and also work part-time in the evenings at the local Waitrose.
 
I no longer play cricket, but over the last 3 years have set-up and co-ordinated, and coached the Girls section at my local club, Eastbourne CC, which has so far been very successful with teams going onto win competitions at a regional level.
 During any spare time I might have I enjoy watching most sports, keeping fit, music and cookery.
 
On this trip I am looking forward to meeting up with old friends and making plenty of new ones, and building on the foundations laid by the previous CWB projects…

Jules Farman

Growing up in a cricket mad family, the game has always been an important part of my life and I love the way cricket brings people from all different backgrounds together, so I spend most of my spare time doing what I can to ensure this continues.I serve on the Thames Valley Cricket League Management Committee.  I chair the Scorers Committee and work on the Player Eligibility and Rules and Match Conditions Sub-Committees, ensuring that the league’s good health continues. Just recently I have undertaken the role of Buckinghamshire’s ECB Scorers Education Officer and spend most my summer Saturdays scoring for Chalfont St Peter CC.

Up until this year my cricket playing experience was catching practice with my family when growing up, helping the Chalfont Colts section and playing cricket with anyone who is up for it when going to watch England play overseas. In view of this forthcoming venture, I joined Ickenham Ladies CC to gain experience! Just to break up the all out cricketing lifestyle, I love to salsa dance and go to gigs.

Mark Bibbing

This is my first tour with CWB and I hope to make it my first of many with the charity doing a lot of work in Africa to let them enjoy cricket as much as I do.I am a level 1 qualified coach and spend all my summer with cricket whether that be playing it or coaching the local u11's u13's and u15's teams and have just accepted that my summer is cricket.

In my spare time I love listening to music and running as I am off to join the army in January so its a great way to keep fit. On this trip I am looking forward to lots of laughs and putting a lot into a community that is less forutnate than the one I live in.

James Alder

I count myself as very lucky to have found a cause that I can so easily identify with and be motivated for.

The interview at a sun drenched Oval cricket ground last autumn was the spark to what has become a roaring flame of excitement, as the leaving date draws ever closer.

Knowing that we have an opportunity to go and make a real difference to people so far away from our reality is overtly appealing in itself and to do so using cricket, a sport which I love dearly, is truly a gift.

I can't wait to see the beauty of the people and their country, and hopefully leave having continued the fantastic legacy that CWB have established already.

Abhimanyu Gahlaut

Lee Booth