Chairman

Kevin Henry

Kevin joined McRae Residential Care Services Limited in 1994 as Managing Director. Since then, he has successfully steered the company through the registration of three children’s homes and the introduction of its educational provision, culminating in the purchase and subsequent opening of Kingsdown Secondary School.

Prior to joining MRCS, Kevin spent 16 years working as a design engineer and manager for various companies in the manufacturing sector. He has a BENG (Hons) and MBA qualifications.

In addition to his role as Managing Director of MRCS, Kevin was also a governor of Croydon College for 9 years before becoming Chair for 5 years. He is also a director of Focused Fostering Services Ltd.

Kevin first introduction to Yabac was when Ben Lilley invited him to train with the squad at Tooting Bec in 1976. He joined the newly created ‘junior team’ in 1977 and played in the Invictor League for the next 4 years before focusing on playing Semi-pro Saturday football with Whyteleafe FC and Merstham FC.

Kevin returned to Yabac when they joined the Mordan and District League’s 1st Division in 1984, which they won in their first season. He was part of the Premier league winning team and subsequently captained the Surrey Senior Cup winning team in 1987. Kevin left Yabac in 1990 after captaining the team that won the treble whilst playing in the Sportsman league.

Secretary

Samuel Polson, LLB (Hons) Law

Sam joined YABAC in the late 1970s having heard of the club whilst playing Sunday league football. Sam was invited to attend for pre-season trial at Tooting Bec common. He and the other trialists were initially nervous as they were put through their paces by George Cascoe. Sam eventually learnt that he had been successful and joined the squad.

Sam continued to work as a mechanical electrical engineer and looked forward to Thursday evening training. Whilst he loved the football sessions, the gruelling runs, covering many miles, was not so enjoyable.

Through the intervening years, Sam changed career to become a solicitor, specialising in mental health law and progressed to partner at a London firm. Sam’s present position is consultant senior solicitor, based in the south of England.

Sam’s life has been intrinsically linked with YABAC FC. YABAC is an extended family to Sam and many others. In addition to wonderful experiences on the football field. He has enjoyed social events and formed lifelong friendships.

The sense of supporting team mates on the football field and the mutual feeling of brotherhood has been empowering. This brotherhood and social network have endured. However, in recent years, it has led to reflection and a sense of loss due to the passing of friends connected to YABAC FC.

In this regard, Sam spoke with George Cascoe, Lloyd Mitchell, Budgie Carr, Gus Nwanokwu, Michael Walker, and Kevin Henry to form the YABAC FC committee. Subsequently, Sam’s wife Sephona, Stephanie Henry and Denise Harris also joined.

The committee was established in 2021 to revive past social and sporting events. Our last reunion was held in 2002.

Through cohesive teamwork, we successfully organised The YABAC Family Funday, which took place 30 July 2022. The event was well attended.

The YABAC FC committee’s focus is to reacquaint old friends and their families, in addition to organising social events to raise funds to support local communities and organisations, to make a positive change for young lives. This is encapsulated in the mission statement, to ensure that the YABAC legacy continues and is passed on to future generations.

Treasurer

Michael Walker, ACIB

Michael is a recently Retired Banking Director, with 45 years’ experience across Retail, Commercial and Investment banking; having worked in Europe, South America, the Middle East, and the Far East.

He is interested in all forms of sport, particularly football, rugby, tennis, and golf. He’s also a Spurs Season Ticket holder for his sins!

He is very passionate about supporting the aims and aspirations of YABAC FC as he is very aware of the challenges facing the youth of today. He hopes to share his career experiences and encourage young people, using the experience of a long and successful career working for a global bank. He was one of the first black branch bank managers in the early 90s and is looking to help causes that support and encourage young people. He firmly believes that you can succeed in whatever you choose to do, if you have the right support, desire, and ambition.

Communications Officer

Gus Nwanokwu

Born in London to Nigerian-Irish parents in the late 1950s, Gus played for YABAC FC under George Cascoe and Leonard ‘Budgie’ Carr in the Morden & District League from the early- to mid-1980s, mainly as a goal-scoring centre forward. He was also selected to play football for England Universities during the season he met George and the Cascoe family. Gus worked with George’s wife Pat in a care home for children with severe educational needs. Pat invited Gus to visit the Cascoe family home in West Norwood before graciously offering him a room to spend the final two years of his university degree course off-campus. Apart from four years working in the psychiatric health services, he spent thirty-five years teaching in the education sector, five years at secondary and thirty years at tertiary level as an FE college Lecturer and Manager, during which time he gained an MSc masters degree in Education. Spent “the best year on my life” teaching A Level Sociology at Excelsior Community College, situated in the foot of the Wareika Hills, Mountain View Avenue, Kingston, Jamaica from 1988-1989, where he survived Hurricane Gilbert and a tense and violent political period of the island’s history. Having dedicated his life mainly to educating and supporting young people, sport, and football in particular, has always been central to his life outside of family commitments. In the hope that younger generations of the YABAC fraternity will come together, Gus was motivated to try to resurrect the YABAC ‘family’ whilst attending (the sadly-departed YABAC FC winger), Neville Carter’s nine-night in 2021. Thankfully Budgie agreed and committed to taking on the YABAC FC Community venture jointly with Gus. An avid Arsenal supporter and committed family man, Gus travels regularly to his family home in Nigeria where he will probably eventually retire and settle.

Other members

Glenmore George Cascoe

George arrived in London from Jamaica as a thirteen year old in 1958. In addition to his family he always loved sports, especially rugby, cricket, and football. He was a founder member of YABAC FC as a player under the inaugural manager Alex ‘Ben’ Lilley in the late 1960s, before becoming manager himself in the late 1970s. Under an outwardly disciplined and authoritarian demeanour, lay a very sensitive, intelligent, honest, and reliable man who almost unwittingly became a role model for the young men who were to become YABAC FC players and, in some cases, legends. George quickly became the ‘father figure’ of YABAC FC, dedicated not only to success on the pitch, but success off the pitch also as he helped to mould and re-direct the lives of many young people through football. Ahead of his time, George mentored and oversaw the development of many young peoples’ lives whilst he was a Royal Mail Post Office manager in his professional career! He now regulates and oversees the workings of the YABAC Community and its Committee, by whom he is revered and forever highly respected. He will remain a giant in the history of YABAC FC.

Lloyd Mitchell

Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Lloyd arrived in London in 1964 just before his thirteenth birthday. After having lived in north London for a year, he moved south of the river to Croydon where he attended Tavistock school. He left school at fourteen years of age, which coincided with his step-father putting him out of the family home. Like all true survivors, Lloyd slept rough for a year whilst attending the ‘University of Life’, before being taken in by the McKnight family with whom he lived for two years. He attended Croydon College where he successfully completed a five-year engineering apprenticeship. He played football for Bingham FC and Beulah FC before meeting Ben Lilley, YABAC FC’s first manager, when they worked as engineers together. Ben invited Lloyd to play for YABAC FC in the 1970s where he developed into a strong-tackling, dedicated, committed, and uncompromising full back. Lloyd and wife Theresa became fully integrated into the YABAC FC fold, taking responsibility for washing the kit on a weekly basis. Also, motivated by his fascination of playing for an all-black team, Lloyd introduced and recruited many players to the team from the Croydon area. He played for YABAC FC Seniors under George Cascoe, for whom he developed an unswerving affinity the utmost respect as a ‘father figure’. Lloyd also enrolled for and attended Wandsworth FE College with full back counterpart at YABAC FC, David Quintyne, where they both qualified as electrical engineers. Lloyd, David and YABAC FC manager Leonard ‘Budgie’ Carr bought and ran a thriving shoe shop in Brixton which they were eventually forced to sell in the aftermath of the Brixton riots in 1985 which brought about a downturn in business. The ever resourceful Lloyd and Theresa, by now a formidable partnership and raising their own family, ventured into purchasing property. This was especially significant as they were to use one of their properties as a home to house young children, after having been advised by another YABAC FC stalwart, Monty Glasgow (also now sadly deceased). Both Theresa and Lloyd channelled their life experiences into caring for and supporting disaffected children in the Borough of Croydon, before Lloyd was head-hunted by Westminster Council to work as a specialist foster carer, mentoring and looking after troubled young children. As well as training future foster carers, Lloyd went on to spend twenty-nine years enhancing the lives of the very many young people he supported in the foster care service, enabling them to live independently through teaching them general life and social skills.

Leonard Alexander Carr – AKA ‘Budgie’

Born in Jubilee Hospital, Kingston, Jamaica in 1953, Budgie arrived in England in 1959. He attended Ravenstone Junior School in south London before going on to Balham Boys Secondary School where he was a member of the Morden Schools Trophy winning team in 1967. An intelligent, skilful, talented, and creative player on the ball, he earned representative honours playing for South London Schools at U13, U14 and U15 levels, before signing schoolboy forms for Crystal Palace FC in 1967. He joined YABAC FC in the early 1970s and played under both Ben Lilley and George Cascoe before going on to successfully complete his FA Coaching badge to become a trophy winning YABAC FC manager himself in the mid-1980s. He describes this appointment as “the easy job of managing YABAC FC with so many talented players!” He also successfully ran and managed his own business for forty five years, the vast majority of which were in the heart of the Caribbean community, as well as enterprising joint ventures with other members of the YABAC FC community. Having recently retired, Budgie describes his current situation as “having a rest.” Budgie will go down in YABAC FC history as one of its stand-out players and most successful managers. He was also instrumental in resurrecting the YABAC FC Community group with co-creator Gus Nwanokwu and remains a dedicated and reliable member of the YABAC FC Committee.

Denise Harris-Williams

A career Civil servant and retired HM UK Diplomat, Denise has had a distinguished career during her 40 years working with Central Government.

Denise held senior management positions for the UK Government, covering several sectors, including Energy, Infrastructure (Rail, Airports and Ports) and Homeland Security.

Denise’s background is in international business development, identifying, negotiating, and providing UK government support to UK companies pursuing high value international infrastructure projects, through her bilateral relationships with international institutions and foreign governments, including EU institutions, World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), UK Research Council, and a host of stakeholder organisations across the USA and Asia. 

Denise’s last diplomatic posting was to Houston, Texas & Washington USA, where she was international business advisor to the UK Ambassador for the USA, Sir Nigel Sheinwald. In this role, Denise developed a strong relationship with the commercial teams at the White House, the result of this was the highlight of her career; attending the inauguration of President Barak Obama & meeting President Obama & the First Lady of the United States, Michelle Obama, at the official inauguration ball in 2008.

In 2012, Denise worked with Prime Minister David Cameron & the Number 10 Cabinet team to deliver the UK Government’s Infrastructure Day Business Summit, as part of the Prime Minister’s Global Business Summits being held daily at Lancaster House during the London 2012 Olympics.

In 2014, Denise and her team developed and launched the UK Government’s first
e-Exporting Programme, working with online retailers such as Amazon, AliExpress, Alibaba, etc, to provide support for UK companies looking to sell their products to international consumers through digital channels such as e-commerce. For her initiative in developing this successful programme Denise received the “2020 UK Trade & Investment Chief Executive Award”, for Design and Delivery of the e-Exporting programme from Lord Livingston, Minister for Trade & Investment, in Nov 2014.

Following her retirement in 2016, Denise became a consultant to Golden Era International, providing International Business Development support to clients looking to export to Asia. This consultancy opened the gateway for Denise to form a consultancy company, Intelligent Robots International (IRI), with 5 other business contacts, assuming the role of Chief Business Development Officer. IRI’s business model is to work with research institutions & Chinese operatives to develop Artificial Intelligence in the medical space. Denise & her IRI colleagues also advise UK government on AI developments & potential applications in the medical sector.

Denise’s love for football developed at a young age, watching her beloved brother, Granville, play for the YABAC team in the 70’s. Her belief in, and respect for its founder members Ben Lilley and George Cascoe, developed from those early days, respecting the community spirit of YABAC’s ethos, which still remains today.

In 2021 Denise’s beloved brother passed away, and Denise was honoured to be asked to join the YABAC Committee to carry on Granville’s community legacy in an organisation that is so much more to the local community than just a football team.

Sephona Isaacs Polson, LLB (Hons) Law

Sephona’s first contact with the YABAC family was when she met her husband Sam Polson who had played for YABAC FC since the 1970’s. Little did she know that she was to later discover in January 2008 that she was related to Pat Cascoe the wife of the founder member George Cascoe.

Sephona has always had a sense of community and charitable spirit. She has been a family legal aid solicitor for nearly 34 years. She was a Partner/owner for a firm based in Brixton for 22 years and following a merger she is now a Director in a firm based in Borough and Brixton.

She is the General Secretary of the charity Friends of the Heart Foundation of Jamaica which primary fundraises for the Heart Foundation of Jamaica. As part of that charity, she has worked in collaboration with the Jamaican High Commission on their planning committee for the Jamaica 55 Gala raising money for the project “Adopt a clinic” and the planning committee for the Jamaica 60 celebration Garden Party. Recently she was a member of the Electoral Committee for the Global Jamaica Diaspora Council and Global Jamaica Diaspora Youth Council.

When asked to join the current YABAC Committee she had no hesitation in accepting the invitation and has enjoyed working with the other committee members who have been passionate about fulfilling the YABAC’s mission statement. Sephona feels privileged to be part of the YABAC family.