Brian Lara

Brian Lara: Why I’m helping build a cricket stadium in Rwanda

Cricket has provided education and direction in the lives of thousands

issue 13 September 2014

Twenty years ago, in 1994, I had a golden summer. I scored 375 against England in Antigua, a Test record that stood for nine years, and two months later I posted 501 against Durham, which remains today the world record in first-class cricket, as my team Warwickshire achieved an unprecedented domestic treble. I was in my mid-twenties, and of course I was very happy, but I was also very aware that in another part of the world, a great tragedy was unfolding.

Every evening when I turned on the TV there were images of the genocide in Rwanda, and the contrast with my own feelings of euphoria haunted me.

It wasn’t until 2009 that I actually visited Rwanda, but when I did I knew I had to help in some way, and hearing the story of a young cricketer called Audifax Byiringiro helped me start to realise what I should do.

In April 1994, as I was gearing up for my golden summer, Audifax Byiringiro was a six-month-old baby in Rwanda.

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