Six Nations: Luke Cowan-Dickie ruled out for England due to knee injury

Luke Cowan-Dickie has been ruled out of the rest of England's Six Nations campaign due to a knee injury.

The Exeter Chiefs hooker could actually be out for the rest of the season, as a result of the damage he sustained during the first half of England's 23-19 victory of Wales at Twickenham Stadium.

"It's a pretty significant injury," Rob Baxter, Exeter Chiefs' director of rugby said. "It's knee ligament and a bit of cartilage damage.

"There's further assessment going on but he's definitely going to be out for a significant period of time, possibly the rest of the season."

The injury to Cowan-Dickie marks a difficult ending to his Six Nations Championship, one that started with a significant error against Scotland on the opening weekend.

With England leading 17-10, Cowan-Dickie was given a yellow card for an intentional knock-on after batting a Finn Russell kick into touch.

The forward took to social media to apologise after and bounced back well against both Italy and Wales, before suffering his injury.

"Obviously it's a big blow, not just for us, but for Luke himself as he is a very important and very good player," Baxter continued.

"We have got some hope that he could feature towards the end of the [club] season, that is if we extend our season from getting into that top four, but right now it's too early to say if that's fully the case.

"As I said, the biggest blow is for Luke himself as he's just cemented himself as a starter for England. He's going well, he's part of their leadership group and he's a key player both for us and England.

"That said, he's a very good rehabber and if there is a chance for him to get back 100 per cent, he is the guy who can do it. So, don't write him off just yet."

Baxter also confirmed that Cowan-Dickie - who was part of the British & Irish Lions tour to South Africa last summer - is likely to undergo his operation early next week.