The Trotters looked like they had stopped the rot last weekend with victory at Wigan to end a run of six defeats in a row but Saturday's 2-0 home loss against Sunderland left them without a point at the Reebok Stadium after five matches. An uninspiring match looked to be heading for a goalless draw until Stephane Sessegnon grabbed his first goal of the season eight minutes from time, with Nicklas Bendtner adding the second in injury time. Bolton can certainly claim their fixture list as a mitigating factor having played five of the big six already, and Coyle is confident their stay in the bottom three is only a temporary one. The Scot said: "It's not bravery or being naive or anything else. The bottom line is wherever we sit just now is certainly not where I want to be as Bolton Wanderers manager, accepting it's been for a number of reasons. "Because of that start these games take on extra significance because of the stigma involved in being in the bottom three, you want to be out of there and moving up, and that's why today was a great opportunity to do it." Coyle had been delighted with his side's performance at Wigan last week and stuck with exactly the same squad but he had some harsh words for his players after their second-half performance. "We haven't done it and we didn't do it because in the second half we didn't perform well enough," he said. "If we'd got to our standard and our maximum then we could have won that game, there's no doubt about that. "You'll always have one or two slightly off it but we had far too many in the second half, and we got punished heavily. What we must do is not feel sorry for ourselves. We'll look to address what the problem was and get up and running again as quickly as we can." For the first hour it was difficult to see either side breaking the deadlock, with keepers Jussi Jaaskelainen and Simon Mignolet largely untroubled. Bolton began brightly but faded and by midway through the second half Sunderland had taken a stranglehold on the game and were getting closer and closer. Kieran Richardson and 18-year-old Connor Wickham, making his first Premier League start, were denied by last-ditch blocks while Wickham hit the bar with an effort that was almost certainly intended as a cross. Then in the 82nd minute Bolton failed to clear a Sebastian Larsson corner, John O'Shea headed it back across goal where Sessegnon turned and drilled a low shot into the corner. Bolton at last responded and Sunderland were grateful to Mignolet for a super block to deny Darren Pratley, before the visitors wrapped up the points when Bendtner finished off a break with a cool finish under Jaaskelainen. Sunderland came into the game level on points with Bolton and looking for their first away victory of the season, and manager Steve Bruce felt it was tension that made the first half such a poor spectacle. "We got them in at half-time and tried to take the shackles off a bit," said Bruce, who made it five wins from five games against Bolton as boss of Sunderland. "Both sides were nervous and edgy. I'm sure there will have been a lot of clubs like that today, there were three points separating nine teams I think this morning. "We wanted them to try to enjoy it and let me do the worrying and thankfully they've responded in the right way. We played very well in the second half, which was pleasing. "We thoroughly deserved it. I cannot remember going away from home in the Premier League and dominating like that."
