DROITWICH Spa Cricket Club have finally received confirmation from the Worcestershire League that their Division One status has been preserved more than two months after the end of the season.

A run of five wins from their last six games lifted Spa out of the bottom two and seemingly away from trouble as they finished 24 points clear of the drop zone.

But Astwood Bank’s failure to win promotion to the Birmingham League via the end-of-season West Midlands play-offs and Brockhampton’s relegation into the county top flight meant three sides had to go down.

That put Spa’s Division One place in jeopardy but it has now been secured as Evesham will only field one side next season instead of three so must drop to Division 11.

“It’s been a nervous few weeks but we feel justice has been done, particularly after we finished off the season so strongly with a run of victories,” admitted Droitwich’s recently-appointed chairman Martyn Davies.

“Not knowing what the league organisation would be, we could only try and win as many matches as possible in the final run-in to mathematically avoid the drop which is what we did and it was a brilliant achievement from where we were midway through the season.”

Davies said the club was in good shape both on and off the pitch and preparations for the 2020 season had already begun.

“We’ve already had positive discussions with a number of new players which together with some exciting developments off the pitch mean that the club should be in a very strong position come the start of the summer,” he added.

Following the recent AGM, where Davies was elected, four Droitwich captains retained their roles for the 2020 season in Max Young (firsts), Karl Goddard (seconds), Tom Goss (fourths) and Jacey Foster (Sunday).

Paul Foster is taking over as third-team skipper from Tom Gregory who has stepped down.