Darren Bent, £10million signing from Tottenham , headed home after just five minutes to give Sunderland a 1-0 victory over Bolton.
Bent, 25, recently made the headlines for the wrong reasons after he used the Twitter website to publicly criticise Tottenham and express his desire to join Sunderland.
The goal stemmed from a dubious decision from referee Andre Marriner to award a free-kick against Johan Elmander on the near touchline. Steed Malbranque's delivery to the far post picked out the former Tottenham striker, who towered to nod back across goal and past the dive of Jussi Jaaskelainen.
The visiting fans celebrated wildly but they were almost silenced moments later when Fabrice Muamba sliced a fierce 20-yard shot wide of Marton Fulop's goal.
Bolton handed a debut to South Korea midfielder Chung-Yong Lee a debut in the 67th minute when he replaced former Sunderland midfielder Gavin McCann.
Fulop emerged the hero in injury-time when Davis drove goalwards from 14 yards but saw the Sunderland goalkeeper deny him with a brilliant parried save.