ELLIS Perks’ never-say-die attitude has earned the praises of Swindon Robins team manager Alun Rossiter ahead of Poole Pirates’ visit to the Abbey Stadium on Thursday night.

Perks might have scored just one point from four rides when the two teams met at Wimborne Road in the SGB Premiership on Monday night as Neil Middleditch’s Pirates recorded a narrow 46-44 win on home shale.

But the 22-year-old’s performance at Ipswich Witches four days earlier stood out to Robins chief Rossiter, who has since thrown his support behind the talented Brit following a dose of critical comments on social media.

Rossiter said: “I’m not interested in the negative comments regarding our reserves.

“Ellis scored paid five at Ipswich, and that was the difference between us coming home with three points or four points.

“With the top five we have, we don’t have many options – but I’m happy with what we’ve got.

“Troy (Batchelor) looks good as does Jason (Doyle). Rasmus (Jensen) and Tobiasz (Musielak) started off a little slow on Monday night at Poole but redeemed themselves.

“The problem when a team is running well is that the expectation levels get higher – everyone expects wins.”

With the summer holidays in full swing, Rossiter hopes to see another bumper crowd pack the Abbey Stadium tomorrow.

A positive run of late has placed the Robins within the Premiership’s play-off frame.

Chasing team Wolverhampton Wolves are a point behind, but have raced two more meetings, while third-placed Belle Vue Aces appear most vulnerable to missing out on the play-offs having lost at home to the Midlands side on Monday night.

With Wolverhampton and King’s Lynn Stars benefitting from a late burst of form, Rossiter is keen to eliminate the Robins’ silly errors that denied Swindon a second away win in the space of a week in Dorset on Monday.

“We made a couple of errors and mistakes at Poole. Hopefully we can learn from that and kick on in the next three home meetings,” said Rossiter.

“Poole are dialled into our track like no other team – they’ve drawn both of their two meetings here.

“But we’ve got meetings under our belt now. The kids are on holiday, we’ve got three meetings in a week – I’d love to see the Abbey packed out.”

Ipswich and Peterborough Panthers also visit the Abbey before the turn of the month.