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Munster flanker Daniel Okeke becomes the latest Coventry signing
Munster flanker Daniel Okeke has become the latest player to join the Coventry squad for the 2024/25 season. The 22-year-old flanker arrives at the Butts Park Arena having made three senior appearances for the Thomond Park-based province, including an Investec Champions Cup outing.
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The Limerick-born back-rower, who has spent much of his career with All-Ireland League outfit Shannon where he started playing as a 17-year-old, joined Munster’s academy prior to the start of the 2021/22 season.
Okeke has also won international honours for Ireland at U20s level and this season was also part of an Irish academy group that played against Italy.
He follows the recently departed Paddy Ryan, Eoghan Grace and 1972 Cup winner Robin Cardwell on the list of Irish back-rowers to represent Coventry.
Coventry head coach Alex Rae said: “Daniel is a really exciting player. The feedback we had from Munster was very good and like a lot of quality Irish players, he has found it incredibly tough to break from club rugby into the provinces.
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We’ve heard what the players had to say, what about your favourite moment Cov fans??#ComeOnCov pic.twitter.com/8TgC49ENEe
— Coventry Rugby (@CoventryRugby) May 31, 2024
“He is hungry to come over and show everyone how good he is and we have no doubt we can help him with that.”
Okeke added: “I feel like Coventry will provide me with a good platform to develop my rugby. I’m looking forward to meeting everyone there and really enjoying my rugby.
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“Moving to England will be a great experience for me. I played 20 minutes against Harlequins for Munster but otherwise, this will be my first experience of rugby in England.”
Okeke joins a strong back row group at Coventry comprising former England flanker Matt Kvesic, 2023/24 player-of-the-year Tom Ball, British Army No8 Tiki Nayalo and newly-signed former Premiership flanker Aaron Hinckley.
Munster have very good back row stocks nowadays, lots of guys with very high potential. Okeke is unlucky not to get a contract. If he came along 10 years ago, he almost certainly would have. Could be very good for Coventry.