A spotlight on Eboni Usoro-Brown & Olivia Rae

It’s been great this week to see a few little glimmers of hope on the horizon!

Boris’ announcement on Sunday announced that outdoor exercise would now be unlimited and that certain outdoor sporting activities (such as golf) would be permitted. We were also excited to read in the newspapers this week that professional sport could potentially resume from 1st June, albeit behind closed doors.

We’ve also had some positive wins at Mintridge HQ this week. The programme with Dan Powell from Bowbridge Homes at Windmill Primary School in Raunds, which was supposed to take place on 4th May, started this Thursday (albeit virtually for now) and our programme with George Furbank and Mulberry Homes at Moulton School & Science College began this week too.

As always, we are blown away by the support from our ambassadors and followers. These two ladies are such vocal and passionate ambassadors, helping us to spread the Mintridge message!

Eboni Usoro-Brown

Who?

Eboni made her England Netball debut in 2008 at the age of 20 against Malawi. Since then, she has gone on to represent England numerous World Netball Series, Commonwealth Games and Vitality World Cups. She has an impressive collection of medals from her remarkable career to date, including a gold from England’s historic win against home favourites, Australia, at the Gold Coast in the 2018 Commonwealth Games

She currently represents Team Bath in the Vitality Netball Superleague and has captained the team for the last four years.

We can’t wait to meet the youngest member of the Mintridge family, as Eboni is expecting her first baby this August!

So, how do they inspire us?

Where do we start?

Obviously, there is the incredible netball career. Eboni was still as excited about representing her country after 96 caps as she was the first time she played. Her passion for her sport is tangible and her enthusiasm for netball and sport is contagious!

Also, did you also know what, during her time playing netball at an international level, Eboni also qualified as a solicitor in 2011? She specialises in commercial litigation and manages to juggle this career with her netball career.

Oh, and she has also found time amongst all of this to model for Oasis, with the empowering message that women do so much more than ‘just look lovely’. The campaign captured the players in a range of signature moves that showcase their strength, skill and agility. We loved seeing such strong and confident women in a fashion campaign!

It is no wonder that, when Eboni runs Mintridge programmes, the messages that she gives are so powerful. Learning about how she has bounced back from failures and trials to come back even stronger (both in her sporting and legal careers) is so inspiring!

And how do we inspire them?

When it comes to mentoring, Eboni is a natural. She believes that sport is a great leveller and being able to mentor young people just shows that. She has particularly gained so much from mentoring during lockdown. In fact, she was sharing smoothie recipes with her mentee last week!

Olivia Rae

Who?

Olivia’s passion for cricket started at a young age and, by the age of 11, she played for the Durham County Women’s First team. Whilst at university in County Durham, she was part of the MCC Cricket Centre of Excellence and became Vice Captain for the women’s first team. She also represented the women’s first team at Edinburgh University, where she was awarded a Full Blue for her services to cricket.

She gained her first international cap for Scotland in 2011 against Japan and has an incredible 76 caps to her name.

She now plays cricket for Middlesex County Women’s fist team and has founded a cricket academy which proudly states their mission statement, “To produce a generation of cricket players who are technically competent, tactically wise and mentally prepared”.

She’s also currently studying for a Doctorate in Education, focusing on how emotions affect decision making (particularly in cricket).

As well as being a passionate ambassador for Mintridge, she also an ambassador for iStreetChild, which uses the power of sport to change the way the world sees and treats street children.

So, how do they inspire us?

Olivia is clearly an incredible cricketer. However, as well as cricket, a big focus of Olivia’s is mental health. She has openly spoken about her struggles with her mental health over recent years. When we hear her speak about mental health, we are so inspired about her pragmatic approach to identifying areas that she feels she needs to work on and building strategies to cope and prepare herself mentally. She approaches mental health in a similar way to cricket, identifying that it’s something that needs training to be the best it can be.

And how do we inspire them?

Olivia has always spoken so openly about mental health and the value of gradually building yourself a support network of people who will listen. For her, being a mentor to young people means that she can be part of the support network for these young people and aspiring athletes.