Eastbourne face a real battle this weekend to retain an interest in this year's speedway KO Cup.

At Oxford last night they crashed 53-37 after making an excellent start.

Mid-match the scores were level at 24-all but after that the Eagles were blitzed, as track conditions changed.

However, Eastbourne co-promoter Jon Cook believes his team will be strong enough to pull back the deficit and make progress to the next round.

Up to heat six, Eastbourne had been in the driving seat. In heat one skipper Martin Dugard and American Brent Werner combined for a 5-1 and, to the travelling fans' delight, the Eagles went 10-2 up after two races as Joonas Kylmakorpi and Marcus Andersson won the reserves' race.

Oxford started to peg back the deficit in heat four and the Cheetahs really pounced in heats eight, nine and ten - taking each by 5-1 to open up a 34-26 lead after ten races.

They continued to pile on the pressure to make sure they had a big lead to bring to Arlington tonight (7.30pm) for the second leg.

Oxford: Leigh Adams 13, Todd Wiltshire 9, Brian Andersen 8, Lukas Dryml 8, Ales Dryml 8, Steve Johnston 7, Andrew Appleton 0.

Eastbourne: Martin Dugard 12, Stefan Andersson 7, Brent Werner 6, Joonas Kylmakorpi 6, Marcus Andersson 3, David Norris 2, Dean Barker 1.