Mark Cavendish is to have shoulder surgery on Wednesday, his Omega Pharma-Quick Step team have confirmed.

The Ongar star separated his shoulder after colliding with Australian Simon Gerrans during the final metres in Saturday’s first stage of the Tour de France from Leeds to Harrogate, an accident Cavendish acknowledged was his fault.

The 29-year-old has undergone further examinations since the accident and they have shown that all ligaments around the AC-joint had ruptured and the shoulder separated.

Cavendish’s recovery from surgery is expected to take around six weeks.

“It’s worse than I was hoping, but immediately after the crash I knew something was really wrong,” Cavendish told his team’s website website. “It is really painful, but at the moment all I can do is focus 100 per cent of my effort on my recovery to be able to get back racing for Omega Pharma.”