Tindall heads the list of big names in Gloucester exodus

Tindall lost his England place this season and will now be leaving his club (Getty Images)

Mike Tindall, a World Cup winner in 2003 and a World Cup laughing stock eight years later, will leave Gloucester at the end of the season, after failing to negotiate the two-year contract extension he felt he was worth. The England centre is part of an exodus of high-profile players, most of them full internationals.

It has been a rough season for rugby's resident "royal", who married into the Windsor family last summer. His drunken behaviour during the early stages of the World Cup in New Zealand left him at the mercy of the global media and set England on a rocky road towards the gutter. The Rugby Football Union dropped him from the elite squad on his return and while he was controversially reinstated on appeal, he was omitted again when new coach Stuart Lancaster selected his party for the Six Nations.

It quickly became clear that Tindall's future at Kingsholm was less than secure. With a couple of bright midfield talents – Henry Trinder and Ryan Mills – and the hot prospect Billy Twelvetrees signing from Leicester, there was no obvious reason for the Cherry and Whites to re-sign a 33-year-old with his best rugby behind him. So it has proved.

Linked with a couple of French clubs, including Stade Français and Biarritz, Tindall is far from alone in cutting his ties with Kingsholm. Luke Narraway, the current captain, is joining Perpignan, as is his fellow back-rower Alasdair Strokosch. The hooker Scott Lawson is heading for London Irish; his namesake Rory, a Scotland scrum-half, is also leaving; and the brilliant Samoan centre Eliota Fuimaono-Sapolu is moving to Japan. Others on the way out are the back-row forward Brett Deacon, the wing Tom Voyce and the hooker Matias Cortese.

Wasps, threatened by the twin calamities of relegation and administration, have confirmed that Ben Broster, their senior tighthead prop, will join Biarritz at the end of the Premiership season.

Meanwhile, the Wales captain Sam Warburton's chances of recovering from a shoulder injury in time for the Grand Slam champions' summer tour of Australia remain 50-50. No decision will be made before a consultation with a specialist scheduled for the middle of next month.