The New York Jets have signed a former Sharks and Western Province winger to their practice squad.
Paschal Ekeji, who featured for the Sharks in this year’s Currie Cup, has been snapped up by the NFL outfit after progressing through the league’s International Player Pathway (IPP) programme.
The Jets announced that Ekeji was identified as one of 13 elite athletes from 12 countries in the 2022 IPP intake – a group drawn from the inaugural NFL Africa Camp, which hosted rising talent from South Africa, Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
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Born in Lesotho to Nigerian parents and raised in Bloemfontein, Ekeji was a standout at Grey College before signing with Western Province in 2020. He played Currie Cup rugby for WP in 2023, while also spending a period in the United States pursuing NFL opportunities.
He returned home last year to represent Stellenbosch University in the Varsity Cup and later joined the Sharks, making two Currie Cup appearances before the Jets came calling.
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