Today’s events had a special entry; the Rovers Education staff and students agreed to enter as a guest team, ably supported by 2 Npower team members, who are proud project sponsors.
Unfortunately the day didn’t get off to the best of starts as in almost typical English fashion, the heavens opened and an hour of torrential rain delayed proceedings. Once the rain did finally clear it was the turn of the upper primary students (aged 11-13 years) to take on the Rovers/Npower guest team at football. Unfortunately the primary school students had too much for the guests and come the final whistle a 4-2 victory had been recorded much to the delight of the 300+ crowd that had now assembled.
It was only more bad news to follow when the Rovers/Npower select who then took on the students from the upper high school. The game was played at a much higher tempo and in truth resembled a genuinely competitive fixture. The Rovers/Npower starting line up was primarily made up from the Futsal academy students along with teachers Ben Thompson, Adrian Turnpenny & Joe Burton. Again it was a brave performance in the searing heat and occasional rain showers, but again it was the students from Tumaini Timbwani who emerged victorious winning by a 3 goal margin 6-3. Proceedings then moved on to volleyball and thankfully the guests registered a win, beating the staff team 21-19.
Anticipation is rising for this afternoon’s planned activities as the team take on the Girls football team and then try their hand at basketball. It is a great demonstration of how the power of sport can unify people from varying backgrounds - the day has only seen smiling faces, laughter and joy from children and young people, a sight that is a victory in itself.
This morning Rovers Futsal academy student Matthew Tunnard took the opportunity to interview his buddy for the week; Peter. Matthew tells us more about his story “Peter’s father died when he was young and since then he has been the man of the house, required to support his ill mother. He has worked in various jobs with the aim of providing for him and his mother, and at one of the jobs he fortunately met a friend who was already part of the Education4Life programme. This chance meeting coincided with his lowest point, where he and his mother had taken to eating clay bricks, mixed with un-sanitised water to get rid of the feeling of hunger. Sadly Peter’s mother finally succumbed to her long illness and Peter was left orphaned at still only 14 years of age.
Fortunately Education4Life, the charity and school set up by Doncaster couple Glynn & Jayne Davies arranged for Peter to be taken into the programme. Now Peter is just 1 over 650 children who are receiving schooling & accommodation by Education4Life”.
Thankfully through the generous donation of Npower DRFC Foundation will now be partnering with Education4Life with the aim of raising awareness and much needed funds for this most worthy of causes. You can find out more about HEREeducation4lifeor at the justgiving site set up as part of this project www.justgiving.com/rovergowild
The Rovers Education team will be in Kenya for another 4 days. Keep up to date with their progress here and by following the Foundations twitter page @DRFC_Foundation