THE Professional Cricketers' Association today urged fellow stakeholders in the sport in England to ensure they safeguard its integrity when their chance comes to debate the Morgan Review.

The key recommendations of the review, undertaken by former England and Wales cricket Board (ECB) chairman and International Cricket Council (ICC) president David Morgan, include a streamlining of championship cricket to 14 matches per county each season and an increase from 40 to 50 overs in the domestic one-day competition.

The PCA today expressed "qualified support" for the review, but with reservations they hope county representatives will take note of when they meet the ECB on January 23.

PCA chief executive Angus Porter said: "The ECB board has said the recommendations of the Morgan Review should be accepted in whole or not at all.

"Notwithstanding that, we urge the ECB and the counties to ask whether we can afford the loss of integrity to our domestic competitions, and to consider the enhancements we are proposing."

Those enhancements include an alternative method of devising a fair 14-match fixture list for the county championship from 2014 onwards, with one first division of eight and two second-division 'conferences' of five, rather than two tiers each containing nine teams.

The PCA believe their suggestion would "maximise the integrity of the competition" and "eliminate the element of chance implicit in the structure recommended in the Morgan report".

The players' union also take issue with the proposal to increase the minimum number of Twenty20 group matches to 14, believing the move would be "explicitly for commercial reasons" and would prevent the winners from representing England in the lucrative Champions League in India each September.

The PCA statement nonetheless added: "We welcome the reduction in the volume of first-class cricket and support the goal of ensuring the counties are financially strong and well-managed."