The ECB’s policy will mirror that of the ICC at the highest levels – tier one and two – of the new women’s game pyramid that begins next year.
However, the ban will not apply below that, with anyone who identifies as female still able to play in women’s and girls’ competitions.
The participation of transgender women will instead be policed under the ECB’s “disparity policy”, which covers any player deemed to have a significant strength, stamina or physique advantage over their opponents.
The current policy allows the game’s authorities to make “non-binding” recommendations when it comes to such players on the grounds of fairness or safety.
Imposing a ban at professional and semi-professional level may enable the ECB to avoid the kind of storm that has engulfed swimming and cycling following the emergence of Olympic hopefuls Lia Thomas and Emily Bridges.
The closest English cricket has come to that was when Maxine Blythin, who transitioned as a teenager, won Kent’s female player-of-the-year award in 2019.
She told Sky Sports that same year: “I was born with a condition that meant I never had any real levels of testosterone, which meant I never went through any form of male puberty.
“That condition means I’m eligible to play women’s sport at any level, in any sport, naturally.
“A lot of the debate that’s been going on and around doesn’t actually apply to myself.”
The current ECB policy has raised concerns about changing facilities, with a frequently-asked-questions document produced by the governing body stating: “Trans people should have access to toilets, showers and changing rooms that accord with their gender identity wherever possible.”
Professional players are set to make up barely a hundred of the hundreds of thousands of women and girls who play cricket each year.
Concerned coaches and parents
Last year, Telegraph Sport revealed six first-class counties had demanded urgent answers from the ECB as to why a middle-aged player who transitioned from a man to a woman was being allowed to compete against girls as young as 12.
Multiple letters from coaches and parents whose daughters had faced the player expressed alarm at the safety implications of an adult carrying the residual physical advantages of male puberty playing in the same league as girls. One letter from a coach claimed the player “hits the ball harder than any other I have seen in the league”.
It is understood that the player previously caused injuries, although inadvertently, including one to an umpire and another to an opponent at county trials who was left unable to play for months. Some parents, disturbed at the significant inequalities of power between young girls and an adult who was born male, threatened to remove their daughters from their league in response. One characterised the situation as “unacceptable, uncomfortable and dangerous”.
A mother of one girl in an under-13 county squad acknowledged she had genuine worries about her daughter’s safety, arguing it was “inappropriate” for an adult with the physiological benefits of male puberty to be included in the same league. Another parent of a 12-year-old girl described fears that she and her team-mates would “give up on cricket, because they become so frightened about having to face bowling and fielding of that strength and force. Many girls at this age are only just starting hard-ball cricket, and one incident is enough to turn them off the game”.
At a league meeting designed to discuss anxieties over 12-year-old girls “playing up” into the women’s game and of possible disparities in size and strength, the transgender player’s club objected that they would have to ask the cricketer to “hold back”.
The worries raised by the case became so acute that a group of six first-class counties met the ECB to insist on immediate clarification of the governing body’s transgender policy. All argued they had been left without any clear guidance on the issue of girls’ physical safety or that of bathroom access.
“If I have a 13-year-old girl who needs to change because she has just started her period, she could well be sharing a confined space with a man who, under ECB policy, has decided they are now female,” a source said. “I have real concerns about that.”
Confirming the new policy would come into force next year, the ECB said it had been arrived at “following an extensive consultation”.
It added: “Considerable time has been taken to reach this policy position. The ECB recognises that transgender participation is a complex area, with many strongly held views, and it is impossible to balance all the considerations. We want everyone to feel included and welcome in our sport, and believe the position reached strikes an appropriate balance by ensuring fairness in the elite game while ensuring inclusivity at a recreational level, with specific safeguards in place to manage disparities and ensure safety.”
Sharron Davies, the British swimming icon denied Olympic gold in 1980 by state-sponsored doping in East Germany, and a leading voice in the trans debate, said: “It’s a coward’s cop-out. If it’s dangerous, unfair and unsafe at professional and semi-professional level, it’s the same at grass-roots or pathways. The ECB can’t say, ‘We’ll protect these females but not these females – because they’re not good enough’. All sport for females should be protected and an open category created, made welcoming of all, no matter how they identify. It’s wilful negligence to pretend biological males and females aren’t physically different.”
