PCA says ‘more work needed’ on player welfare as ECB unveil rejigged Blast schedule

The Professional Cricketers Association (PCA) remain at loggerheads with the ECB over the men’s T20 Blast’s schedule. The union, which represents all professional players in England and Wales, has reiterated concerns about player welfare after only a small reduction in the number of back-to-back matchdays in the schedule for 2025 unveiled by the ECB on Thursday.

The ECB heralded a reduction by “almost a third” in the number of back-to-back fixtures (down from 55 in 2024 to 37 in 2025) in the men’s Blast in a press release on Thursday. Neil Snowball, the ECB’s managing director of competitions and major events, said the reduction showed that they “have listened to the players” after “constructive conversations with the PCA”.

But while the PCA are “encouraged” by the changes, they believe they do not go far enough. “There remains a significant number of fixtures on successive days which suggests little improvement compared to the 2023 schedule,” a spokesperson told ESPNcricinfo. “There is a lot more work needed to meet player welfare needs.”

The counties generally prefer to play a majority of their Blast fixtures between Thursday and Sunday, citing a beneficial impact on ticket sales. But players have become increasingly vocal in the last 18 months about the drawbacks of that model, with back-to-back games heightening the risk of injury and diminishing the quality of cricket played.

The ECB’s revamp of domestic women’s cricket for 2025 will see the eight Tier One women’s teams compete in the Women’s T20 Blast and the ten Tier Two teams in a second tier. Every county will host at least one men’s and women’s joint-matchday, with a total of 52 double-headers due to be staged across 20 different venues.

Snowball said that the Blast will be “bigger and better” in 2025, while Beth Barrett-Wild, the director of the women’s professional game, said the joint announcement of fixtures marked “the beginning of a new era” for English cricket: “It’s one of the clearest demonstrations to date of our aligned ‘one game’ approach to the delivery of men’s and women’s domestic cricket moving forwards.”

The first women’s Blast Finals Day will take place at The Oval on July 27 while the men’s knockout stages will continue to be staged in September, six weeks after the conclusion of the group stage. England’s best white-ball players will again miss men’s Finals Day, which is set for September 13 and clashes with a T20I series against South Africa.

The rest of the men’s county fixtures will be released by the ECB on Tuesday morning, with no change in the volume of County Championship and One-Day Cup matches. Fixtures for the Hundred are likely to be released early next year, with the tournament staged in its usual August window.

Key T20 Blast fixtures 2025:

May 29 – June 1 – ‘Blast Off’ weekend (opening fixtures)
July 18 – ‘Friday Finale’ (final group-stage matches)
July 26 – Women’s Tier 2 Finals Day (Northampton)
July 27 – Women’s Tier 1 Finals Day (The Oval)
September 3-6 – Men’s Quarter-Finals
September 13 – Men’s Finals Day (Edgbaston)