SUNDERLAND goalkeeper Robbin Ruiter claims new boss Chris Coleman has taken the fear out of the Black Cats’ relegation fight.

Ruiter says Coleman’s side are no longer scared to make mistakes as they gear up for back-to-back home games against Fulham and Birmingham.

They held Championship leaders Wolves to a goalless draw at Molineux despite playing with ten men for 28 minutes following a red card for midfielder Lee Cattermole.

And Ruiter claims the former Wales boss has already had an impact on the players’ mentality.

“He gives people confidence,” said the 30-year-old Dutchman. “After a mistake it’s not a case of the only way being to the stands or the bench.

“He wants us to play football from the back when it’s possible and when we do we can make mistakes, that’s no problem.

“It’s all about intention. He’d rather you make a mistake with the right intention than be scared and kick the ball away, and that’s a big difference.

“You know you are able to make mistakes.

“You are allowed to make mistakes, but not too often of course.

“We all stick together, train hard together and work hard for each other.

“If you see the team spirit and the fighting spirit we have it’s a normal thing that everybody backs each other up.

“That’s one of the most important things, that we stuck together and got a result.”

Sunderland have now picked up four points in Coleman’s first four games in charge, three of which have been away from home.

But they now face successive games at the Stadium of Light that could have a huge impact on their survival hopes.

And Ruiter believes they can build on Saturday’s point, which brought a second clean sheet in their last three games and a switch to a three-man central defence.

“I’ve said before, it’s normal that the fans at Sunderland are grumpy over the last couple of months,” he said.

“We didn’t show them our best and Sunderland is their life.

“If you see how many people were in the stadium again, it’s not half an hour’s drive, it’s a couple of hours, and they all came to support us.

“That gives us a big boost and it’s really important to show what we can do.

“It’s important for the fans to see we were fighting.

“They all know we can make mistakes and that’s no problem.

“They deserve from us that we fight for every ball and do what we can and if we are sloppy or not concentrated they will be angry.

“I think they were proud of us and we were happy to have them there.

“We’re all really happy with the clean sheets.

“If you keep a clean sheet you only need one goal, and if you don’t, if you’re conceding three or four goals, you’ve got to score three, four or five goals.

“That’s was one of the most important things and hopefully we can continue to keep clean sheets.

“It would be even better if we scored once to get to three points.”