PROP Tomas Francis insists Wales won't "tip-toe around" in Saturday's return Test against England despite seeing fly-half Gareth Anscombe's World Cup dreams ended by injury.

The Ospreys playmaker, who was so key in the Six Nations Grand Slam, will not feature in Japan after suffering knee ligament damage at Twickenham on Sunday.

A scan on Monday confirmed the crushing news for the 28-year-old, who featured at full-back against Australia and South Africa in the last World Cup.

The squad are reeling from seeing Anscombe join number eight Taulupe Faletau, who suffered a broken collarbone at the training camp in Switzerland, on the sidelines.

However, Francis insists the players will be fully focused when they return to the field at Principality Stadium on Saturday with the aim of avenging the 33-19 loss to England.

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"If you go into a game thinking you might get injured then you will," said the 27-year-old Exeter tighthead, who won his 41st cap last weekend.

"You've got to treat it as a Test match and if you go in and tip-toe around then you won't play well or will get injured if you're not hitting it flat out. Every Test match is flat out."

The loss of Anscombe overshadowed a useful hit-out in London as Wales ramp up the preparations for Japan.

Warren Gatland will be demanding a dramatic improvement in Cardiff after his side lost for the first time since February, 2018 to end a run of 14 straight Test wins.

"England played well and we had a lot of unforced errors and mistakes in the first half. Luckily it's not the World Cup now," said Francis.

"In the past 18 months we've made very few unforced errors in this team and stuck to our processes.

"On Sunday we either scored or dropped the ball and we will go back and work on that. It's stuff we can work on and fix."

Defeat denied Wales a place at the top of World Rugby's rankings after New Zealand's shock hammering at the hands of Australia.

"Would it have been nice to be No 1? Yes. But does it matter at this point? Not really," said Francis, who played in five of the World Cup fixtures four years ago.

"It was nice to have a run of winning games, but that doesn't matter now and being at the top in six weeks or so is the aim.

"This is a four-match series for us. It's a bad start, but we have three more games now to sort it out.

"That's all that matters. The world rankings don't matter – it's where you finish in the tournament that counts."

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Wales haven't been in the position of needing to respond to a disappointment since Dublin a year and a half ago.

Francis believes being brought back down to earth isn't a bad thing as long as there is a reaction to their Twickenham woe at Principality Stadium.

"Every area of our game is an area for improvement and that includes the scrum and line-out," said Francis.

"England got the better of us as a pack and if we are going to win the World Cup we are going to have to improve on those areas.

"In the first half we weren't good enough and we know that. We can't do anything about it now, but now it's about how we react and move forwards.

"This weekend is a huge opportunity for us as a squad. We've got another chance to go back at them and that's exciting.

"It's not often in rugby you get a double header in internationals. It will be nice to get the chance to turn it around."

Wales name their team on Thursday at 11am with Gatland having to pick between Dan Biggar, Rhys Patchell and once-capped Jarrod Evans as Anscombe's replacement.

Dragons lock Cory Hill missed the Twickenham game after reporting a tight left ankle but is expected to be in contention for the return game.

Cardiff Blues scrum-half Williams was initially named as a replacement for the first England match but was pulled out after suffering a shoulder injury in training.