WALES have suffered a blow ahead of the autumn internationals with the loss of blindside flanker Jonathan Thomas and the team’s line-out caller.

Thomas suffered a groin injury which he aggravated playing for the Ospreys during their defeat against Leicester at Welford Road in last week’s Heineken Cup clash.

He has been examined by a specialist this week and he is to have an operation which will rule him out for six weeks - meaning all four November internationals.

He was a key part of Wales’ march to the Grand Slam last season and is the second player they will miss in the series, the other being scrum half and fellow Osprey Mike Phillips, another leading member of that side.

Wales coach Warren Gatland said, “This weekend’s Heineken Cup games are important, we’ll meet on Monday to finalise the squad before announcing it on Tuesday, but two players who won’t be available are Mike Phillips and Jonathan Thomas.

“I’ve been pretty happy with what I’ve seen, there have been a couple of excellent performances, but there’s a long way to go.

“The regions have been working very hard, the Dragons have been disappointing with their start, but they’ve won their last four games.”

Wales captain Ryan Jones, who modelled the revolutionary new Under Armour kit along with age group players including the Dragons’ James Harris, admitted, “We know the Grand Slam was an important progression, now we’ll have an indication of just how far we can go.

“The first Test against South Africa in the summer was disappointing, we were a bit better in the second Test and it could have gone our way.

“Now we’re pitting ourselves against the very best in the world (South Africa, New Zealand and Australia all visit the Millennium Stadium next month).

“We are going out there to perform and we’ll see how good we are in around eight weeks time.”

Jones would not be drawn into the dispute between the WRU and the regions over the early release of players.

“We’re not involved in it and it’ll be decided behind closed doors,” he said.

“We can’t get involved, we’ve got enough with Perpignan in the Heineken Cup, the EDF and the internationals, we don’t want to get embroiled in that.”