AS he ponders his team selection for Friday’s play-off semi-final first leg with Sheffield Wednesday, Sunderland boss Alex Neil finds himself facing a number of dilemmas.

Should it be three centre-halves or a flat back four? Is Lynden Gooch better on the right or the left, and is Jack Clarke or Patrick Roberts a better bet in a wide attacking position? If, as looks likely, Nathan Broadhead is unavailable, who should play just off Ross Stewart in attack?

And then, there is also the small matter of Aiden McGeady. Having recovered from a knee ligament operation to take a place on the bench for the final game of the regular League One season at Morecambe, McGeady is in contention for a starting spot on Friday night. At the very least, he will hope to get on the field as a substitute if he finds himself back on the bench.

But is McGeady still a potential match-winner, capable of changing a game in an instant with his breaks down the flank and incisive passes into the box? Or at the age of 36, and having been absent since mid-November, is the Irishman now a luxury Sunderland cannot afford in a play-off campaign that is likely to be extremely keenly contested?

Lest we forget, we have been here before. In 2019, in Sunderland’s maiden campaign in League One under Jack Ross, McGeady fractured a bone in his foot during a 3-0 win at Accrington at the start of April. He tried to soldier on with the aid of painkilling injections, but his form began to dip as Sunderland began to stutter, losing to Coventry and recording costly draws against Burton and Portsmouth.

Ross decided to take him out of the firing line, giving him time to rest and recover for the play-offs. Yet while he was named in the starting line-up for the first leg of the semi-final against Portsmouth, he was forced to withdraw in the warm-up, still in significant pain. He missed the second leg at Fratton Park as Sunderland made it to Wembley, and was named on the bench for the final against Charlton.

Yet when he was brought on in the 72nd minute against the Addicks, with the score at 1-1, it was clear he was not really fit. He failed to threaten in the closing stages, and was left in despair, like the rest of his team-mates, when Patrick Bauer claimed the 90th-minute winner that condemned Sunderland to defeat.

Fast forward three years, and the parallels are stark. Again, McGeady has missed the closing stages of the league campaign because of injury. Again, the Irishman finds himself back in contention ahead of the play-off semi-finals. Again, his manager is wrestling with the difficult decision of if, or when, to throw him back into the fray.

Ross decided McGeady was worth the gamble. He would have started him in the semi-final if he had been able to, and sent him on at Wembley in a dramatic last-ditch attempt to change the game.

The key differences this time around are threefold. First, McGeady is another three years older, and it can be argued that his powers were on the wane before he damaged his knee. In his 16 appearances in all competitions this season, he has scored just three goals.

Second, his spell on the sidelines has been much longer during the current campaign. McGeady has missed more than five months of football, whereas in 2019, he was out for just four weeks, albeit that he had been receiving treatment for his foot issue for much longer.

Third, and perhaps most significantly, he has never played under Neil. Whereas Ross had watched McGeady pull matches out of the fire, Neil has not worked with the winger at close quarters, other than in training in the last couple of weeks. Understandably, he might well feel less certain of McGeady’s current performance levels.

And yet, as Sunderland desperately try to avoid what would be a fifth season in the third tier, it is hard not to wonder if the veteran might be the missing piece in the promotion jigsaw. Yes, he is not the player he once was. But it is only last season that he was ripping League One defences apart, setting up a hatful of goals for Charlie Wyke and delivering the slide-rule ball to Gooch that won Sunderland the Papa John’s Trophy at Wembley.

Clarke and Roberts, his main rivals for a starting spot on the wing, have their qualities, but they do not boast McGeady’s pedigree, class or potential to strike fear into the opposition. McGeady’s name on the team sheet might be the missing one per cent that helps get Sunderland over the line. Or it might be the sentimental mistake that seals their fate. Neil will have to decide which way he is going to go over the course of what is hopefully the next three matches.