Six months out for Sam Simmonds

Exeter number eight Sam Simmonds has ruptured his anterior cruciate ligament in his knee and will miss six months, it has been confirmed.

With less than a year until the World Cup this is a major blow to his chances of making the England squad while the Chiefs will miss his presence.

Simmonds has scored five tries so far this Premiership season and suffered the injury against Worcester Warriors at Sandy Park last week.

“Sam Simmonds has ruptured his ACL. He’s going to go for a reconstruction, so that’s going to be six months onwards,” Chiefs director of rugby Rob Baxter told Sky Sports, while also confirming that lock Jonny Hill will miss up to 16 weeks due to surgery for a finger ligament problem.

With a positive spin, Baxter said: “The only thing I can say to Sam with any certainty is, he’s a young player and the reality now – with all the talk of player welfare and the number of games you can play – the one thing is he’s not going to be playing any games for the next six months.

“Who knows what’s going to happen to the back-row resources between now and the World Cup? The other guys are going to be playing – they are the guys who are more likely to be picking up injuries than Sam.

“Also, he’s a young guy – a six-month break now at this time in his career, he’s got a really good break now. He’s got an opportunity of getting really mentally and physically fresh for what might be a fantastic two or three years for him after this injury.

“Yes, he’s going to miss out on some big games now, but you’d hope that those big games can get added to the end of his career because he’s not taking the battering now.”