Toon boss Alan Pardew was delighted to put their bad run, and especially last weekend's home defeat by West Brom, behind them, and felt the return of defender Mike Williamson after four months out with an ankle injury was key.
Alan Pardew: "We put ourselves under pressure with the West Brom result so it was important today that we gave a more disciplined performance and I think we did that.
"We felt from the last two games that four points would have been really pleasing. We didn't manage to get anything against West Brom but we got three very valuable ones today.
"In the Premier League you don't want to create pressure for yourselves by having a winless run like we were on. We felt certain things didn't really go for us in that period but we had round pegs in round holes today.
"Williamson made a big difference to us because he's a natural centre-half. As much as Bolton threw at us, him and (Fabricio) Coloccini had the answers."