Childhood Eastbourne Eagles fan Lee Richardson admits he will probably never sign for the team he used to support.

The Hastings-based Grand Prix rider learnt his speedway on the renowned junior track at Arlington and grew up cheering his father Colin riding for the Eagles.

But he will have no time for favours for his local club when he visits with Swindon Robins tonight looking to help them to their second win of the season at Arlington and to revive his own flagging Elite League form in the process.

Sympathy to his friends in East Sussex comes second place to showing his own fans what he can do.

Speaking immediately after a five-point haul in Saturday's GP at the Millennium Stadium, Sussex's latest GP competitor he admitted: "My form for Swindon hasn't been good this year but my form in Poland and Sweden has.

"I've bought quite a few engines and I've had a complete mind boggle but now I'm just going back to basics.

"I need to race well for Swindon. I've been very very lucky in that the supporters have been very loyal to me.

"I've gone through a tough time for Swindon. Since the start of the season I haven't been riding as well as I had done and I had a terrible meeting at Oxford last week.

"I owe them something. I apologised to them because I lost the meeting for them at Oxford and we need to go to Easbourne and give them something back.

"It's a nice place for me to go to. There are a lot of friendly faces there. A lot of people from Hastings follow me in the Grand Prix so when I'm at Eastbourne they go over.

"My dad obviously raced there for a long time. He works in Kuwait now and he only comes over once a year so I don't really see him.

"I don't know why I never went to Eastbourne. I even raced there as a junior.

"To be honest, though, I've signd for Swindon and I don't want to ride for any other club until I finish."

The 27-year-old, who commutes to meetings from his High Beach home, is also unlikely to guest for Eagles having decided to cut back on extra meetings after pulling out of a match for Poole after one race due to exhaustion recently.

He said: "I've kept my schedule to 110 meetings this year with the things I have to do like the World Cup, the British final, the Grands Prix and doing all the meetings in Poland.

"I get one day off a week on average. I need that to see my wife and my son and we've got another child on our way.

"Your average Joe doesn't realise what happens. I'd love to take someone with me for ten days, just to open people's eyes.

"We all do it. We get up at 4am three days a week, go through the whole day travelling, go racing, get a couple of hours' sleep and get up again to go to another country.

"When I did that guest booking at Poole I was up five mornings in a row at four o'clock. People don't see that.

"The racing is the easy part."

Eagles boss Jon Cook admits his team start as underdogs tonight and hopes they respond by heading off a third home defeat.

He said: "We could not have asked for a tougher meeting in our current positon but maybe that's what we need to get us firing again."

If it is any consolation, the opposing No. 5 will probably be supporting the Sussex club. But only when his racing days are over."