Press Association Sport understands the 22-year-old midfielder wants to hear what the Barclays Premier League outfit have to say after they tabled a bid of around £5million.

Johnson, who has scored 12 goals for the Coca-Cola Championship club this season, is out of contract at the end of the current campaign.

Strachan confirmed yesterday a series of potential buyers had contacted the Teessiders, some of them with verbal offers and at least one with a formal bid.

Sunderland, Johnson's hometown club, are long-time admirers, while Everton too have been linked with him.

However, Strachan has repeatedly insisted the England Under-21 international is not for sale, and he remained defiant at his pre-match press conference yesterday morning.

He said: "We have had verbal offers in the last week for Adam, but nothing has changed.

"Adam is still here and I would expect him still to be here for the last 19 games of the season.

"We have had verbal offers, we have had one official offer and I would imagine after looking at those that Adam will be here for the rest of the season, which we are quite delighted about because he is coming back into form.

"That's great for us because when he is on form, we are a better team, that's for sure."

But Johnson, who spent much of his formative years in the first-team squad playing under-study to England international Stewart Downing, is ambitious and wants the chance to at least talk to City.

Strachan's men play host to Bristol City tomorrow, with just one place and one point separating the sides.

Leicester are another team pushing for the play-off places, but back-to-back defeats against Swansea and Barnsley have set them back in recent weeks.

With league leaders Newcastle awaiting them tomorrow, it will require a big effort from the Foxes if they are to make up the three-point deficit on the top-six.

Captain Matt Oakley believes their biggest problem of late has been a failure to finish off any opportunities.

He told www.lcfc.com: "In this league if you take your chances you take the points, but we are just not taking them and getting in front.

"When you see our statistics, when we are in front we don't get beat so we have to make sure we do that."

Nottingham Forest are on the heels of Newcastle in the standings, and will be hoping their recent form will help them record their first ever win at Pride Park against local rivals Derby.

Billy Davies' men are protecting an unbeaten run of 19 matches, and beat QPR 5-0 in midweek, but have fitness doubts over central defender Wes Morgan.

Bottom club Peterborough travel to Crystal Palace looking to make up the five-point difference on Reading, who take on Barnsley.

The other fixtures tomorrow see West Brom take on Sheffield United, Cardiff host Doncaster, Sheffield Wednesday play Plymouth, Watford entertain Swansea, Coventry tackle Blackpool, Preston host Ipswich and QPR play Scunthorpe.