He suffered the injury at the 2019 World Wrestling Clubs Cup held in Bojnurd in Iran in December, and was set to miss the Tokyo 2020 Olympics before the postponement to next year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Karimi has three Wrestling World Championships medals to his name including a silver in the 92 kilograms freestyle category from Nur-Sultan in Kazakhstan last year.

His surgery was reportedly successful, according to Tehran Times, after he was operated on at Arman Hospital.

Orthopaedist doctor Sohrab Keyhani spoke about Karimi's surgery and said: "He tore his ACL on his left knee and it meant he had to undergo surgery.

"Fortunately, the operation was successful, an ACL surgery can take six months to recover."

Karimi is also a three-time Asian Wrestling Championships gold medallist.

He won at consecutive editions from 2015 to 2019, and also has a gold medal from the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta in Indonesia in the 97kg.

He sparked controversy in 2017 when he purposely lost a match at the Under-23 World Championships to avoid a match against an Israeli opponent.