London, Apr 28 (IANS): With the coronavirus outbreak bringing the world to a standstill and sporting events across the globe getting cancelled or suspended, even the English Counties are set to suffer losses as the ECB has already made it clear that there will be no cricket till July 1. Former England skipper Michael Vaughan feels scrapping contracts of overseas players could be a way to save some money.

"You have to look at every area where you can save a few quid. Traditionalists will go mad at this, but these are unprecedented times. In the next two years, could you look at not having overseas players for the four-day game?" Vaughan said while speaking on the Tuffers and Vaughan Show on BBC Radio 5 Live.

"Four-day cricket costs the game. I'm a die-hard four-day and five-day player. It is a cost to the game that could, just for a couple of years, be worth reducing. If you reduced it from 14 to 10 games, you'd miss the games but I don't think it would be a huge problem for a couple of years. You could go back to that in two or three years."

The Yorkshire County Cricket Club in a statement on their official website said on Monday that the contracts of R. Ashwin , Keshav Maharaj and Nicholas Pooran have been cancelled by mutual consent.

South African left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj had agreed to re-join the White Rose for their opening two County Championship fixtures against Gloucestershire and Essex.

Later this summer, Yorkshire were set to add yet more international experience to the spin department with India's Ravichandran Ashwin due to play the majority of the remaining Championship fixtures.

West Indies batsman Nicholas Pooran had agreed a second stint at Emerald Headingley after agreeing to re-join as Yorkshire Vikings' overseas player for the 2020 campaign.