Coventry City striker on pressure, formation and striving for more goals

CoventryLive provides Coventry City news as Ellis Simms evaluates his first half-year with the Sky Blues.Ellis Simms has undoubtedly caused controversy among Coventry City supporters. While some seem dissatisfied and are still holding out hope that the striker would live up to his high price, others recognise a young, gifted player who is still in the early stages of his growth.

These days, the Sky Blues take great satisfaction in their ability to coach young players to bring forth their greatest qualities, and Simms is a wonderful fit for that philosophy. The Everton summer acquisition, who is still only 23 years old, has four goals from 16 Championship starts and 14 bench appearances thus far.

More recently, he was used as a lone striker in a role he shared with Matty Godden. In this relatively new system, which has been very productive overall with goals coming from other sections of the club, both players have arguably lacked service and scoring opportunities. An example of this was seen in Saturday’s game at Norwich, where Simms was in good positions in the box but was unable to score a goal. On the one occasion when he appeared to have the ideal pass in front of the goal, the referee chose to blow for a foul that had been committed seconds earlier rather than giving the Sky Blues the advantage.

When asked how he felt about his first half of a year at City, he replied, “I think it’s going okay.” I’m having a great time here at Coventry. The guys have been fantastic, and I get along well with them. The fan base is really encouraging. The manager and coaching staff are helpful, knowledgeable about the game, and provide daily assistance to the entire club.

He said, “I’m a striker and I want to be scoring as many goals as possible, but so far I’ve only scored four goals,” in an interview with Sky Bet. I believe that everyone is aware of my desire to have scored a lot more goals, but the team’s recent winning and unbeaten streak is what matters most. As a team, we’re doing well and gaining points both at home and occasionally on the road. This relieves some of the pressure on me to score, but I’m confident that the goals will materialise shortly.

When asked what he believed to be the cause of the team’s remarkable turnaround in performance and form, he responded, “I think the shift in team formation is the secret to our turn in form and results, whether that was down to the personnel we had or players playing in more natural positions, so I think that could be an element.”

“We had a poor run of play in October, and I believe the first game in that run we had a good result was at home against Stoke in November. After that, we had an international break, which gave us time to practice hard on the training field. We had to put in a lot of effort and organise some team building since we knew we had talented players in our dressing room; perhaps this contributed to the outcomes we were able to achieve. We took a close look at ourselves and realised that we shouldn’t have lost some of the games we had played. After that, it just clicked, and we’ve been winning lately.

“As a striker, and having had played for different teams, I’ve got experience playing as a lone striker and with a partner up front so for me, personally, it’s not been a shock,” he said when asked how he’s found playing in the changed formation since the start of the season. He now leads the line with a fluid forward three just behind him.

“I think there are advantages and disadvantages to playing alone or with a partner, but as of right now, I feel like this team’s one striker is working well with the three behind him.”

“My hopes and ambitions for the remainder of the season are to make sure we stay in the play-off places,” he responded when asked about his personal goals for the remaining games of the season. My personal goals are to increase my goal totals, assist more teammates, and make sure I play more frequently to support the team. In the end, the most important objective is to finish the season in the play-off spots.

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