LEE JOHNSON is confident that Aiden McGeady will be fit and firing for Sunderland’s play-off campaign despite the Irishman having been forced to sit out last night’s 2-2 draw at Hull City.

The Black Cats’ failure to take all three points at the KCOM Stadium means they are now all-but-guaranteed to miss out on automatic promotion as they trail second-placed Peterborough United by seven points with just four more games to play.

Jordan Jones and Grant Leadbitter were on target last night, but Josh Magennis’ two goals for Hull means Sunderland’s winless run now extends to four matches.

McGeady was watching on from the bench in Humberside, but was not named in the matchday squad after suffering a foot injury in last weekend’s defeat at Blackpool.

The Irishman has suffered severe swelling, but an X-ray has produced a positive result and Johnson is not anticipating a lengthy lay-off.

“If you saw his foot, you wouldn’t believe it,” said the Sunderland boss. “It doesn’t match up in terms of how bad it looks, but how good it feels. It’s absolutely black. He’s been stamped on the top of his foot, but he played on, which shows you what a warrior he is.

“He’s a tough little cookie and plays through niggles, but it was a bad one. He tried to take his boot off at half-time in the last game, and almost couldn’t. He then had to get it back on and didn’t really say anything, but then when he took it off after the game, his foot really swelled up.

“We tried to rush him through, but he just couldn’t do it so we had him X-rayed today, and that was positive. It’s a case of trying to flush this swelling out as much as possible now. It’s a best-case scenario in terms of the X-ray. We couldn’t have asked for any more in that sense.”

Last night’s game ended a run of three successive defeats, although Johnson insists he has never been too worried about his side’s form.

The loss at Wigan came courtesy of a definite off day, but Johnson feels Sunderland performed reasonably creditably against Charlton and Blackpool and could easily have won last night. As well as scoring two goals, the Black Cats also twice struck the woodwork through Jones and Aiden O’Brien.

“I’m objective about our performances, almost to an obsession,” said Johnson. “And in those three losses, in two of those we haven’t deserved to lose.

"We knew we dropped below our standards against Wigan, we accepted that. But if you look at a period of 18 or 19 games, to let ourselves down once, that can happen."