WORCESTERSHIRE paceman Josh Tongue will miss the rest of the 2019 campaign with a side strain.

Tongue suffered the injury when bowling on the opening day of this week’s Specsavers County Championship defeat at Northamptonshire.

The grade two side strain will rule him out of action for six to eight weeks.

Tongue has taken 17 wickets in four Championship appearances this summer at 18.94 to top the County’s bowling averages.

The 21-year-old was making his first Championship appearance at Northampton since the end of May after sustaining a nerve tissue injury in his upper arm.

Tongue has been unfortunate with different injuries during the past two years with ankle and metatarsal problems forcing him to withdraw from Lions squads against West Indies and Pakistan respectively.

But either side of those setbacks he has featured in plenty of Championship cricket for Worcestershire.

He played all 14 matches in 2017, picking up 47 wickets, and 11 last summer when he finished with 40 victims.

Worcestershire head of sports science and medicine Ben Davies said: “Josh has a grade two side strain and will be out of action of six to eight weeks.”