Eldon 2 were ready for a new challenge in division 2 after an excellent 2021/22 campaign saw us promoted as champions, however, we were well aware of the tough task ahead! Our squad remained mainly unchanged with only Alan dropping down to the 3rds and replaced by their star player Chris Dunlavy, while Ollie stepped up to no.2 due to his unbeaten season last year!

We kicked off the season with a match against our old rivals Consett 1, who were promoted alongside us this season. As in previous meetings, it was a tight encounter that went all the way to the wire.  Will, James and Mark were unavailable so Alan stepped up but lost 3-0 at 5, Adam responded with a 3-2 win at 4 and Chris won in his 2nd team debut to put us 2-1 up. Ollie looked rusty after a summer with little practice and lost 3-2 to put all the pressure on Andrew but as he often does he came out on top to give us a win in our opening fixture.

We had mixed success in the next 4 fixtures, winning against Sunderland 3 but losing the others. We still managed to collect a respectable 29 points, but we lost Chris for the rest of the 1st half due to a nasty ankle injury.

Sitting near the bottom of the table by mid-November, luck wasn't in our favour, as in our match against fellow strugglers Primrose 3 we were without 5 of our 7 players! This left Will and an unwell Adam to play at 1 and 2 while 3rd team players Alan, Dave B and Matt B filled in admirably at 3, 4 and 5. In spite of this weakened team, we managed 9 crucial points but it wasn't enough for a win.

The last 2 games of the half went in a similar vein, good performances but not enough to get us some much-needed wins. We ended the half with 2 wins from 8 sitting in 3rd bottom which, in a new initiative from the league, would see us play in a relegation play-off vs the 3rd top from division 3.

There was certainly hope that we could fight our way back up the table, with Chris returning from injury in the 2nd half and the addition of Dan Hookway from the 1st team at no.2 there was a chance we could catch those just above us in Concordia 1 and Primrose 3.

We started brightly in the opening fixture to beat Consett 4-1, picking up a valuable 19 points against a relegation rival. However, we couldn't back up our positive start as we had to face Northumberland 3 who boasted the talents of 15-time county champion Bryan Beeson and former premier league player Ryan Doran, both of whom contributed to our swift 20-0 defeat. This loss was followed by an agonising 3-2 defeat to 2nd bottom Sunderland 3.

Despite losing 2 of our last 3 we had inched out of the bottom 3, 1 point above our next opponent: Primrose 3, which was another one of those games that could have been. James and Adam lost 3-0 and 3-1 respectively but Will and Dan were both 2-0 and looked sure to level things up. Unfortunately Dan picked up an injury in the 3rd, which saw him miss the next 3 games, and lost 3-2, and Will faltered under the pressure and also lost. Andrew did his best and salvaged 3 more points with a win, giving us 8 in total, but we fell back into the dreaded bottom 3.

We picked ourselves up for the next match and ground out an important win away vs Concordia, picked up an unexpected 8 points against 2nd place Boldon 1 and then beat playoff promotion hopefulls Tynemouth 3 4-1, a run of 3 games that earned us 41 points and put us 1 point from safety behind Primrose 3.

Our final league match of the season was against a strong Northern 3 side who sat in 3rd, all we had to do was better Primrose's points tally by 2 to avoid a relegation playoff. The fixture didn't start well as Adam and Chris both lost tight matches 3-0. Will and Andrew then took to court and in regular fashion, their games both went to 5, however the 5th game curse struck again for Will as he lost his 8th 5th game of the season ending any hopes of a win. Andrew also fell at the last hurdle losing game 5 15-12. Not to be left out Dan also played a brutal 5-setter but he came out on top, to give us a total of 7 points. After an anxious few days waiting for Primrose's results, we were hit with the tough news that they lost 4-1 but their 9 points saw them retain their status in the division, just 2 points ahead of us.

Fate was still in our hands, however, as we could stay up with a win over division 3's 3rd placed team Hexham 2 in the league's new end-of-season playoffs! We were confident our team of Andrew, Dan, Ollie, Will and Chris were up to the task and that proved to be the case. Our team was far too strong for Hexham and we won 5-0, 20 games to 3! Despite the nerves, we showed our quality when it mattered most and cemented our position in division 2 for another season after a long, tough campaign with far too many 3-2 defeats!

Player of the Season

Chris Dunlavy - Chris won 6 of his 9 matches in his debut season with the 2nds. Without an untimely injury forcing him to miss 7 matches our season could have been much different!

Honourable Mentions

Ollie Drewett - in his final season for the team he performed excellently at no.2 in a very tough division, winning 50% of his matches. Ollie will be a big miss next season.

Dan Hookway - dropped down from the 1st team in the 2nd half to help us out and was a big presence on and off the court.

All of the 3rd team players who helped out this season: Alan Coates (3), Richard Martin (1), Matt Barnes (1) & Dave Brocklehurst (1).

-Adam Coates