Belgium's two WorldTour teams, Dettunink-Quickstep and Lotto Soudal, may see their budgets cut due to possible cuts from major sponsors as the coronavirus crisis continues, a Belgian newspaper reports.

Serious discussions are underway between team managers and the team's sponsors as no racing is taking place at all during the sport's current shutdown.

Lotto Soudal is one of the teams, along with the CCC team, Astana, Bahrain McLaren, and Mitchelton Scott, that have already reduced the salaries of their riders, and in most cases staff.

Deceuninck-QuickStep's main sponsor has now told the Belgian newspaper Het Nieuwsblad that he and team manager Patrick Lefebvre are discussing a reduction in donations. [Deceuninck CEO Francis Van Eeckhout told "nieuwsblad.be" on Tuesday, "We wanted to enjoy the benefits of sponsorship, especially now that we are in our second season [as sponsors]. Now I can't do that."

." But we know how many riders, sport directors, carers and drivers are employed by the team." He added.

Lefebvre, an experienced team boss, has always been realistic about the difficulties of raising the budget to run one of the biggest and best teams in the world, while at the same time defending the team's current situation.

"Last year they [team sponsors] were of course spoiled. Now we are not winning as much, but you can't say we are not providing exposure"

.

"In fact, we have more media awareness than last year, and last weekend over 600,000 people watched the "Virtual Tour of Flanders."

"But I want to wait until April 20 to get the full picture," Lefebvre said, and asked De Tuningk to review the budget situation then, according to Het Nieuwsblad.

The paper also spoke to Lot Soudal's two main sponsors.

Joke Vermoere, a spokesperson for the Belgian national lottery, the Lotto, said, "We stress that our contribution is provisional and will not change for the time being," and that the May 15 deadline for the Tour de France organizer, ASO, to decide when the Tour He added that the outcome of the May 15 deadline, when the ASO, the organizer of the Tour de France, will decide when the Tour will be held, will be key.

"If that happens, there may be some adjustments to the sponsorship budget," Vermeer said.

"We're not going to drop the team, but it makes sense that some sort of adjustment would be necessary," said Marko Heijl, PR manager for co-sponsor Soudal. We are in daily contact [with the team], but this situation will affect the team's sponsorship budget."