JERMAIN DEFOE has backed himself to score the goals needed to fire Sunderland to safety in the final three games of the season – as long as his team-mates continue to provide him with chances.

Defoe is set to be a key figure in the final throes of Sunderland’s survival push, with his stoppage-time penalty in last weekend’s 1-1 draw at Stoke City having made it four goals in the striker’s last seven matches.

His equaliser at the Britannia Stadium left Sunderland a point behind North-East rivals Newcastle United, and while the Magpies will be strong favourites when they travel to bottom club Aston Villa on Saturday, the Black Cats continue to have a game in hand with matches against Everton and Watford following this weekend’s home game with Chelsea.

Norwich City, who are currently a point behind Sunderland, cannot be ruled out of the equation, but Defoe insists he would rather be in his own club’s position than that of either of their rivals.

And with this weekend’s action likely to prove pivotal to the outcome of the relegation fight, the 33-year-old is happy to be shouldering the responsibility for scoring the goals Sunderland need to survive.

“I always back myself to score,” said Defoe, who has claimed 17 goals in all competitions since the start of the season. “I’m always trying to do that, and I always back myself to succeed.

“I’ll be trying to get myself into areas where I’m going to score. I believe that going into these next few games, I will get the chances. Hopefully, I can take them because the goals are needed now, more than ever.

“We desperately need the points now, and if you’re going to get the points, you’ve got to score goals.”

Sunderland have taken five points from their last three outings, but there is no guarantee that a similar haul from the next three games will enable them to finish outside the bottom three.

They were not at their best against Stoke, but their previous performances against Norwich City and Arsenal hardly smacked of a side destined for the drop.

Since Sam Allardyce arrived in mid-October, the majority of Sunderland’s performances have been reasonably strong, but as the Black Cats boss freely admits, his players have struggled to translate some decent displays into points.

If that continues in the next two weeks, they will find themselves in the Championship, and Defoe accepts the time for taking solace in an acceptable performance level is over. With three games remaining, points are all that count.

“You look at the teams who are up at the top, and they’re not always producing good performances,” he said. “But they still win games.

“To be honest, for me, the performances don’t matter anymore. It’s just about the points now – pure and simple. If we win against Chelsea and Everton, no one will care about what the performances are like. We just have to find a way to win those games.”

At a similar stage of last season, Sunderland claimed back-to-back victories over Southampton and Everton that ultimately proved decisive in enabling them to avoid the drop, and 12 months earlier, late-season wins over Chelsea and Cardiff sparked a four-game winning run that kept the Black Cats safe.

Something similar is needed again, and while Newcastle’s players have precious little experience of fighting against relegation, Defoe is hoping his team-mates’ battle scars will help them hold their nerve.

“We all know what we need to do,” he said. “A lot of the lads have been through this so many times. We’ve got lads who have done it at this stage, and other lads who have played in massive games right through their career.

“We’ve got that experience, let’s see if the other teams can handle things as well. It’s going to be interesting, and I’m sure it will go down to the last day.”

The next three games will dictate what happens to Sunderland’s squad this summer. The club’s most recent accounts revealed a wage bill of around £70m and an annual loss for the 2014-15 financial year of around £25m, so even allowing for the relegation clauses in a number of contracts, stringent cuts will be required if the worst happens.

Even if Sunderland survive, however, there is a likely to be a major overhaul of resources, with Emanuele Giaccherini, who is currently on loan at Bologna, set to be the first to leave.

Giaccherini, who is expected to be named in Italy’s squad for this summer’s European Championships, has scored seven goals in 26 Serie A appearances for Bologna, and the Italian club have confirmed a desire to sign him permanently.

“Signing Giaccherini does not depend only on Sunderland, who don’t need the money, but it comes a lot down to the player and how successful he is in making the English club understand what he wants to do,” said Bologna owner Marco di Vaio.