{"id":412390,"date":"2026-01-14T13:33:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T13:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/412390\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T13:33:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T13:33:14","slug":"sale-target-junior-kpoku-loaned-out-by-racing-to-a-top-14-rival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/412390\/","title":{"rendered":"Sale target Junior Kpoku loaned out by Racing to a Top 14 rival"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sale Sharks target Junior Kpoku has secured a loan move away from Racing 92 to a rival Top 14 club until the end of the current season.<\/p>\n

The England U20s World Rugby Junior Championship 2024 winner started in the Parisian club\u2019s 32-13 defeat last Saturday at Cardiff in the EPCR Challenge Cup<\/a>. <\/p>\n

That was just the 20-year-old\u2019s sixth appearance in 2025\/26 for Racing, and he has now been loaned out to Toulon until the end of the Top 14 season. <\/p>\n

A club statement read<\/a>: \u201cToulon is pleased to announce the immediate arrival of\u00a0Junior Kpoku<\/a> from Racing 92 on loan\u00a0until the end of the 2025\/26 season.<\/p>\n

Stands out for his versatility<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 20-year-old has joined the Toulon pack to bolster their ranks and address current absences in the second and back rows. Boasting an impressive physique (2.03m and weighing 119kg), this young player with high potential will bring his power, physical presence, and energy to the red and black squad for the remainder of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cAn England U20 international, Kpoku stands out for his versatility, athletic qualities and commitment to the fight, making him a promising profile in European rugby.\u201d<\/p>\n

Toulon sports director Laurent Emmanuelli added: \u201cThe arrival of Junior Kpoku addresses an immediate need for reinforcement in our pack. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe is a young player with enormous potential, a powerful and athletic profile, capable of playing in both the second and back rows. This loan will allow him to continue his development while providing us with a valuable solution for the end of the season.\u201d<\/p>\n

The switch will see Kpoku link up with four former England Test players, Kyle Sinckler, David Ribbans, Lewis Ludlam and Zach Mercer, who all featured in last Sunday\u2019s Investec Champions Cup<\/a> win over Munster.<\/p>\n

Glasgow Warriors confirm the departure of British & Irish Lions star to Top 14 heavyweights<\/a><\/p>\n

All Blacks in crisis as Ardie Savea \u2018seriously unhappy\u2019 with finger pointed at Scott Robertson<\/a><\/p>\n

It was last week when Sale boss Alex Sanderson<\/a> admitted he was in the hunt to sign Kpoku for next season, even though the forward is contracted at Racing until the summer of 2027. <\/p>\n

The Sharks are keen to bring the youngster to Manchester<\/a> having lost out on George Martin, the Leicester player who signed for Saracens, and Chandler Cunningham-South, who extended his Harlequins deal. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a good chance he could come here, but nothing is agreed,\u201d said Sanderson. \u201cThat would be outstanding if we could snag him. He is some kind of an athlete.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were just doing some stats on him and he is in the top 10 for dominant carries, dominant tackles, out of all the second rows in the Top 14. That is as a 19\/20-year-old and just shows the foundation of where he could get to.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe is an international athlete and someone needs to make him into an international player. We feel like we are good at that.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Loose Pass: Time to penalise \u2018unsporting\u2019 behaviour while Toulouse fall foul of Stoke analogy again<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sale Sharks target Junior Kpoku has secured a loan move away from Racing 92 to a rival Top…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":412391,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,1208,2592,818,1182,218039,44,760,176848,85,68429],"class_list":{"0":"post-412390","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-france","12":"tag-home-page","13":"tag-internationals","14":"tag-junior-kpoku","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-rugby","17":"tag-sale-sharks","18":"tag-sports","19":"tag-top-14"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=412390"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412390\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/412391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=412390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}