Ross McCreath received a standing ovation after he addressed an audience of 180 guests on Tuesday night in the Long Room of Lord’s Cricket Ground in London.
Ross McCreath received a standing ovation after he addressed an audience of 180 guests on Tuesday night in the Long Room of Lord’s Cricket Ground in London.
he guests included the founder of the International Award for Young People (which is known as the President’s Award for Youth Empowerment in South Africa), His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh, who said in his speech how impressed he was with Ross’s achievements in founding the Tiger Titans a cricket team in Bathurst’s Nolukhanyo township.
Sixteen-year-old Ross hails from Bathurst and is Gold Award participant. The theme of the evening was how involvement in sport can positively change a person’s life and be a valuable tool for individual and community development.
Ross is living testiomony to this as he saw a need in his local community and acted on it. The evening was also attended by iconic cricketers such as Mike Gatting OBE; Derek Underwood MBE; Mark Ramprakash;
Rob Key and Angus Fraser, among others as well as distinguished guests from the World Fellowship which exists to support the global development of the International Award Programme.
Earlier in the day, the St Andrew’s pupil spent some time with Mike Gatting at Lord’s talking about the Award and with Gatting giving him some tips on the gentleman’s game.
On Wednesday, Ross visited the office of His Royal Highness at Buckingham Palace for tea and attended the offices of the Commonwealth Youth Programme, along with His Royal Highness The Earl of Wessex, Prince Edward, himself a Gold Award holder and International Trustee of the International Award Association.
Ross became involved in this exciting social innovation project as part of his participation in The President’s Award for Youth Empowerment Programme.
He has achieved the bronze and silver levels of this international youth development programme and is currently actively involved at the gold level.
Through his continued involvement with the award programme, McCreath has extended his project by developing a soccer team in the same township near Bathurst which is strongly aligned with the country’s focus for the Fifa World Cup.
