Craig Tears is a Senior Lecturer in Sports Therapy and Rehabilitation and joined the Sport and Exercise team in January 2017 Craig graduated as a physiotherapist in 2004 from the School of Health and Social Care at Teesside University with a first class honours degree and is a member of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy.

Following graduation, Craig gained experience in the health care industry working in his local NHS hospital. He shortly became a senior physiotherapist specializing in musculoskeletal medicine. During this period he developed his knowledge and skills in the treatment and management of sporting injuries by providing physiotherapy support for local sporting clubs.

In 2007 he was offered the opportunity to work for Premier League football club Sunderland AFC. Initially, this role involved working within Sunderland's highly productive academy, becoming Head Academy Physiotherapist in 2010. Craig’s role during this period was to develop the academy physiotherapy department and ensure that medical provision met the strict criteria for a category one club within the Premier League’s Elite Player Performance Plan framework. In 2013 he was appointed as a Senior Physiotherapist to the club's first-team squad providing daily treatment, injury rehabilitation and match day support to the team. This is a role he held until December 2016 when he joined the Sport and Exercise team at Teesside University.

Craig’s research interest lie in the management and rehabilitation of athletes with injury and the use of innovative injury reduction strategies to reduce the incidence of injury in sport.