OTD: ROBBIN RUITER DEBUT

On this day in 2017, Robbin Ruiter made his Sunderland debut in a 2-1 League Cup win away to Carlisle United. Ruiter signed for SAFC following a tenure of five years playing for Dutch club, FC Utrecht.

The big ‘keeper impressed in pre-season under Simon Grayson, who had taken on Ruiter on a trial basis. Ruiter caught the eye during his trial period, with many claiming he should be made our number one for the season. His signing was announced just days after our 5-0 hammering by Celtic, when the need for a competent goalkeeper was highlighted.

Ruiter is infamous for his rather severe finger injury, which led to the emergency signing of Lee Camp, who was somehow even worse than the Dutchman’s competition in goal, Jason Steele. When the injury occurred, manager Chris Coleman began to rotate Camp and Steele, who are regarded as two of the worst goalkeepers in the history of the club.

During his time on Wearside, his lowest moment certainly came in a home draw against Millwall. He let two identical goals squirm over the line, in the form of a pair of extremely tame free kicks, which any keeper should be routinely saving.

Ruiter was prominently featured in the Netflix original documentary, ‘Sunderland ‘Till I Die’. His performances and injury were a focal point in the documentary, much to his dismay.

Ruiter spoke of the series:

"Last season I played a few mediocre matches, and two very bad ones, one was against Millwall, then I got a classic ball through the posts, a giant deflection. Well, those pictures were of course in the series but I had good matches in goal too, kept five clean sheets. I was on form until my injury, that would be a storyline in one of the episodes, but when I looked at the series, I did not notice it."

When Sunderland were eventually relegated to League One, Ruiter was one of the few players who didn’t leave the club. He was used by Jack Ross as an understudy to Jon McLaughlin, who was the far superior shot-stopper.

Despite seeing his game time massively reduced, Ruiter was one of Sunderland’s standout players in the early stages of the Checkatrade Trophy. He made two penalty shootout saves with a great display against Stoke City Under-21s on the way to the Lads getting to Wembley and impressively managed to keep five clean sheets in six games in the competition.

His contract expired after the play-off final and Ruiter moved back to the Netherlands, signing for PSV for free, before more recently playing for Willem II then Cambuur. He had a brief appearance-less spell with Nordsjælland in 2023 prior to retiring.

Robbin Ruiter has continued to follow the club after he left, he was in attendance at the 2022 League One play-off final. He also went to Trafalgar Square the night before and was happy to mingle with our supporters. For ALS 268, we interviewed Robbin and he spoke in more detail about his time at Sunderland.