HAMPSHIRE director of cricket Giles White will wait until he knows which teams have qualified for the Champions League T20 before signing a fourth overseas player for 2015. White is pleased next season’s format suits his overseas-player plans, but it will be several months before he is ready to target a strike bowler for the difficult LV County Championship run-in, when Hampshire are away to Durham, Somerset and – after hosting champions Yorkshire in their penultimate match - Nottinghamshire.

He said: “We haven’t secured an overseas player for September yet and we won’t be able to go too far down that route Champions League till we know what teams have qualified for the Champions League, but we’ll be talking to Kyle Abbott and Imran Tahir, potentially.”

Glenn Maxwell looks less likely to return as the second T20 overseas player.

“That very much depends on his availability,” says White. “At the moment he’s involved in all forms for Australia and that will clash with our T20 competition.”

What is certain is that Andre Adams and Jackson Bird have been signed for the first three months of the season, while Yasir Arafat has been snapped up as a limited-overs specialist who may also be available in the LV County Championship.

A back injury forced Bird to pull out of a similar stint with Northants on the eve of last season, but he played his first first-class match for eight months in the latest round of Sheffield Shield games, until they were abandoned following the Phillip Hughes tragedy.

White is confident he will be ready to hit the ground running on April 12, when Hampshire take on Sussex.

He added: “It’s the same format as last year – Championship heavy at the front end of the season, 50-over cricket in August and then the Championship run-in in September. That’s pleasing because it suits our overseas players nicely with Andre and Jackson up front and Arafat for the one-dayers.

“And Sussex is a good place to start, they’re a consistent first division side so it is a chance to test ourselves early on.”