Wales are likely to be without prop Tomas Francis for a proportion of the Six Nations after the Exeter Chiefs player underwent surgery on a shoulder injury.

Francis sustained the issue during the national team’s Rugby World Cup semi-final defeat to South Africa and will be sidelined for up to four months.

“After two or three scans it became clear that Tom needs an operation to repair the shoulder injury he picked up with Wales at the World Cup,” Chiefs director of rugby Rob Baxter said. “It’s not great news for us, but at least we know where we stand now.”

It is a blow for both Wales and the Chiefs, who have moved to bring in Argentine tighthead Enrique Pieretto on a deal until the end of the season.

Pieretto’s signing will help ease the injury crisis in the Exeter front-row with Greg Holmes another long-term absentee.

Baxter added: “We’ve therefore moved pretty quickly, not just because we’ve lost Tom, but also Greg’s Achilles has proved more problematic than we first thought. Again, he’s going to be out for two or three months, so we felt it was the right thing to do to strengthen ourselves at tighthead.

“That doesn’t mean we are not going to continue to develop guys like Marcus Street or Alfie Petch, but we don’t want to leave ourselves in a situation where another injury could leave us really stretched.

“Therefore, we looked on the marked and, as things happen, Enrique is over here playing for the Barbarians, he’s here, he’s ready to go, he’s played at the World Cup and with the Jaguares, and it just works for us to get him involved with the squad.

“We’ve been able to have a good look at a number of his games, both at club level and international level, and at 24 years of age, he’s looks a good tight-head. That said, we still feel we can work on him and get even more out of his game, which is hugely exciting.”