WEYMOUTH Doonan Wildcats will fight “tooth and nail” for victory at the Newport Hornets tonight (7pm), according to chairman Phil Bartlett.

The Wildcats topped the National League after last Friday’s home win over the Rye House Cobras but a narrow defeat at the King’s Lynn Barracudas just a day later saw the Radipole Lane outfit drop to third.

And Bartlett’s troops, who have raced fewer meetings than the current top two, are keen to return to the summit at the earliest opportunity.

However, the Weymouth chief is aware that the Hornets pose a major threat this evening. He said: “Newport have got a strong line-up so it’s not going to be a walk in the park, especially as they are at home and teams tend to have good home records.

“We’ve just got to do the best we can. We’re at full strength and we have a good team ourselves, all we can do is race what’s in front of us.

“Mark Burrows scored a maximum the last time he was at Newport’s track and all our other boys can ride there as well, so what will be will be.

“To go there and nick three points, or even four, is a difficult task but we’ll just have to see how things pan out.

“On the road we’ve beaten Scunthorpe already and we ran King’s Lynn close in a meeting we probably should’ve won. We’ll do our best tonight and hope to do Weymouth proud.”

Former Wildcat skipper Karl Mason is expected to line up for the Welsh side tonight, as is another ex-Weymouth rider Sam Hurst.

Bartlett added: “Newport have a good side so it’s not going to be easy but we’ll fight tooth and nail. They’ve got Karl Mason and Sam Hurst who both used to ride for us but our boys are fired up for it.”

Another potential barrier for the Wildcats tonight is the weather forecast, which predicts heavy rain in Newport.

Wildcats: 1 Mark Burrows, 2 Terry Day, 3 James Cockle, 4 Matt Wright, 5 Lee Smart, 6 Tim Webster, 7 James White-Williams.