Sheffield Wednesday’s mystery trialist revealed: Owls take a look at former Liverpool youngster, Okera Simmonds
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Simmonds, who last played for Accrington Stanley, has also spent time with Blackburn Rovers since leaving Merseyside, and he put in a decent performance while leading the line for the Owls’ U23s at Hillsborough.
The 20-year-old, who is the older brother of Manchester City’s Keke Simmonds, was brought off midway through the second half with Lee Bullen’s side leading 1-0, and had put himself about well in an attempt to impress and try and land himself a deal at Wednesday.
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Hide AdSpeaking to The Star after the game, which ended with a harsh 2-1 scoreline to Birmingham City after two late goals, Bullen explained the reasoning behind bringing Simmonds in.
‘Bully’ said, “We lost Korede to the red card in the last minute at Hull, so we were very short up top and we can’t continually dip into the U18s because they play Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday every week.
“So we tried to get a couple of striker trialists in, one was available, and to be fair to him, for the time he was on I thought he did well. He handled it, was a physical presence and understood the game plan with the high press and trying to set the triggers to force Birmingham to give us back the ball.
“So he’s one we’ll look at again, but it’s very difficult for any trialist nowadays. With the club and their finances, we’ve got to be careful who we bring in.”
