IT is two hours before racing time and Sean Courtney prepares to address those the stadium announcer dubs as gladiators.

Courtney, the team manager of Glasgow Tigers, has driven 110 miles from his home in Berwick and now he faces the hard yards on the dirt of Ashfield. His gladiators are wounded, sitting at the wrong end of the speedway premier league and depleted by the departure of James Wright, viewed as a reliable points winner, who has lost form and confidence.

The red revolution of the Tigers is grinding slowly, with a miserable run of defeats preceding yesterday's loss against Workington Comets, a team with genuine aspirations of winning the title.

Courtney is disappointed but not dismayed. "It's been a tough start. We expected it to be tough, but not that tough," he says. Businessman Alun Biggart, who lives in Denmark but has been a fan of the Tigers since boyhood, has led a new consortium to power at the team and the journey has been fuelled by undimmed enthusiasm but unrewarded by results.

Courtney wanders among his riders, knowing that this is professional sport, that everything could change in a second, that one result could turn everything around. It did not come under the sun yesterday, after the Comets brought their own brand of insuperable heat.

But the Tigers' team manager exudes an optimism that may have be tested but remains unbroken. "This one of the toughest times I have had in speedway," he says quietly of a career in the sport that included 20 years of riding, nine of them with Glasgow.

In the splendid sunshine of Ashfield stadium, his determination is met with an initially bright, competitive start against the Comets. This is interrupted by Harley Horwood crashing off his bike and heading to hospital for observation. Another gladiator is wounded. His absence leaves Glasgow under-manned for the afternoon.

It places the spotlight, too, on the Tigers' need to recruit quickly. "I have been on the phone for the last two weeks desperately trying to secure a new rider," he says. "You cannot panic but I know the team has to be improved."

He adds without drama: "You are used to riding in a team, but as team manager I feel that I am contesting every one of the 15 heats." He has made one signing, but one who cannot sit on a bike during a race. Steve Lawson, Glasgow's record point scorer and hero of times past, has agreed to come to help on race days.

"Some of the lads needed a wee bit of advice technically," says Lawson, who raced for Glasgow from 1978 to 1992. "Confidence is more vital. When your heads are down, it is hard to win races. But I believe this can be turned round." He has taken a couple of riders to his farm near Workington in an attempt to improve starts and burnish belief.

Courtney, who works for a firm of stonemasons and took on the job in Glasgow only because of his affection for club, insists the Tigers are not an endangered species.

"There are enthusiastic, committed people here who are in it for the long haul," he says. His words are reinforced by the efforts of a team of volunteers who work cheerfully and a hardcore of fans who greet a 40-50 defeat with a weary acceptance of the reality of the gap in quality between the sides.

The attendance of these supporters is crucial to the health of the Tigers. The business plan for the club demands a presence of 700-800 souls. Tigers are falling about 100 short of that.

"Our supporters have not criticised the team," he says. "Everyone knows we are fighting for the survival of speedway in Glasgow. I am open with the supporters and tell them exactly what is happening. I do not see the need to hide when results are bad." Courtney franks this assertion by addressing fans at the end of the contest, giving an update on team news and promising more hard work – which is greeted with supportive applause.

His presence in the pits was also conspicuous yesterday. The frantic interludes between races were filled with him reshuffling the line-up after injury and encouraging his riders as engines roared, exhausts cracked like gunfire and the smell of fuel added to the sense of imminent explosion.

Then his team took to the dirt, flashing around the track in the blur of a minute, throwing debris on to the clapping spectators. Unfortunately, Comets in the shape of Richard Lawson, unbeaten on the day, and Kyle Howarth had riders who could finish in under a minute. The effort of Joe Screen, who battled for nine points for the Tigers, was heroic, the effort of his team-mate, James Grieves, was commendable. But the result was inevitable.

"I came here because I knew the people I was dealing with," says an undaunted Courtney. "The Glasgow people are tough. If there is a battle, then they battle. They do not shy away from it."

He remains as determined as he was when he faced the trials of speedway on two wheels.

"We have to meet this challenge," he says. "I thought long and hard before I got involved here because I knew the size of the task. I will not bow down before it."

The Tigers did not win yesterday against superior forces. But there was more than a hint of a defiant roar from Courtney and those who gathered under the Springburn sun.