Mark Robins was left disappointed as the Sky Blues were held to a 1-1 draw by Sunderland at the Ricoh Arena.
Despite going a goal down in the second half, Jonson Clarke-Harris fired the Sky Blues level with 22 minutes remaining.
However, neither side could find a winner and the City boss believes that a draw was probably a fair result.
He said: “I’m disappointed to not come away with the win but I’d say it’s a fair result.
“I think the chance we had was just what we wanted, and you expect to see that hit the back of the net and you come away with all three points.
“Coming back from a goal down is a plus. It was a good goal, a well worked goal. Having lost Junior, we had to reshuffle the back four which is always the last thing you want to do but I thought Dujon was outstanding and he had a big hand in the goal.
“Their injury changed their shape and it went to a back four pretty quickly because they’ve lost the players that make their back three function.
“Honeyman dropped deeper into midfield but I thought Lee Cattermole started to get involved in the game a little bit too much and that’s the equivalent of our budget, that one player.”
The away side came into the game sitting in fourth place in League One and Robins believes that the Black Cats will be challenging at the top end of the table come the end of the season.
“That’s the best side we’ve played all season, home or away.” He said.
“They are strong and financially strong, but they’ve got their own issues to sort out and Jack Ross has done tremendously well to date, and they are certainly going to be up there this season.
“We can hold our heads up because I thought we went toe to toe. We’ve tried to win the game and a lot of good things have come out of it.
“We’re not happy to go a goal down but to come back and equalise and then almost win the game was good. The supporters showed that, it was good value.”
Todays game also saw Jodi Jones make his long-awaited return to the side after suffering a season-ending injury last year.
“Jodi Jones back on the pitch was brilliant and I think that will give him a big lift.” The manager said.
“The supporters were fantastic showing their appreciation for the work he has done to get back playing again.
“There was a lot of good things to come from that game but now we’ve got to recover for Tuesday.”