How many points does Chris Wilder believe Middlesbrough, Huddersfield Town and Sheffield United need to secure Championship play-off spot

The right wing-back has been a revelation since Wilder took over in November, but missed the midweek defeat to Fulham through illness.

Incredibly, Boro have another right wing-back challenging Jones for the Championship team of the season but Djed Spence, who picked up the division’s player of the month award for March, is on loan at Nottingham Forest.

Wilder will look for better cover for Jones in the summer, but is glad he does not have to today.

“In an ideal world we’d have like-for-like because it’s such a specialised position,” he said. “Pelts (Lee Peltier) did a great job for us but he’s not got the same attributes Isaiah’s got, he’s got different attributes and the reason we didn’t win on Wednesday night was not because we missed Isaiah but does it give us a better opportunity of getting a result? Of course it does.

“He’d be up there as our player of the year.”

Defeat pushed Boro out of the play-off places but with seven games left in their case, whose season will be extended is still far too close to call.

“It’s a tight affair and (11th-placed) West Brom have come back flying into the affair,” reflected Wilder.

“I still think Bournemouth will get the job done, they’ve got too much quality and a manager (Scott Parker) who’s got the job done before, but I don’t think (third-placed) Huddersfield have got a cigar out at the moment thinking it’s job done and I don’t think West Brom, Coventry (12th) or Millwall (tenth) have given it up.

“It’s Huddersfield versus Luton (this weekend), Sheffield United versus Bournemouth, teams are playing each other. We have to make sure we take care of our business.

“I think you’re looking at 74, 75 points and you’d be extremely disappointed if you didn’t get in on that number. Teams have got to go on a good run, that’s the top and bottom of it.”

Boro are on 62 points, four behind Huddersfield and six ahead of Coventry. They have a game in hand on both.

Hull are 20th, but Wilder sees beyond that, pointing to five away games unbeaten, with seven points from their last three.

“Hull are on a great run away from home and we’ve got to make sure we deal with that,” said the manager of a side whose eight-match winning streak at the Riverside ended in midweek.

“They’ve had a full week (without a game) which I do believe is a bit of an advantage but this is how it is and I wouldn’t have turned a quarter-final (in the FA Cup, which caused the Fulham game to be rearranged) down for anything.

“They’ve got some really good young players – (George) Honeyman, (Keane) Lewis-Potter, who’s taken a lot of plaudits this season through some fantastic performances, Jacob Greaves at centre-half.

“They’ll be relatively happy with their first season back in the Championship, mission accomplished in terms of being in the division for another season. But they’ll want a strong, positive end to the season like we all do.”