Britney Spears faces a bitter divorce battle after her husband Kevin Federline vowed to fight for custody of the couple’s two young children.

A day after the pop star filed for divorce at a Los Angeles court, citing irreconcilable differences and seeking sole custody of Sean Preston, 14 months and Jayden James, eight weeks, her husband responded by filing court papers also demanding sole custody of the children.

Spears, 24, had suggested that her husband only be given visitation rights. She also waived her right to maintenance from Federline, whose career has yet to match the success of her own, and she asked that each party pay their own legal fees.

But Federline, an aspiring rapper, appears to want a slice of his wife’s multi-million dollar fortune in addition to custody of his children, with the documents revealing that he will seek spousal support too.

"Kevin is prepared to go the distance in order to do what he feels is necessary to protect and safeguard the children and will not be intimidated or dissuaded from pursuit of those goals," said Michael Sands, a spokesman for Federline’s lawyer, Mark Vincent Kaplan.

Reports have said that Spears, who has sold more than 76 million records wordwide and is the eighth best-selling female artist in US history, was protected against a costly settlement through an "iron-clad" pre-nuptial agreement. Her fortune was estimated at around $120 million by Forbes in 2004.

In the divorce papers, the pop star lists assets including "miscellaneous jewellery and other personal effects" as well as her earnings from after the separation date as separate property - and thereby off-limits to her husband. He says the couple’s community assets are "uncertain", while she claims there were none to speak of.

Spears married Federline – known as "K-Fed" - in the autumn of 2004 to the criticism of some of her fans, who blamed him for the subsequent decline in her career and accused him of being a gold-digging fortune-seeker.

Having first met Spears as a dancer on one of her tours, Federline left his then heavily-pregnant partner, Shar Jackson, for the pop star. Jackson warned Spears that he would never settle into married life.

Many pundits welcomed the singer’s decision to split. "Let me just say on behalf of a happy America - ’Welcome back Britney, we love you,’" Rosie O’Donnell, talk-show host, said on ABC’s The View.

It was widely reported that Federline had no idea about the divorce plans until after Spears had filed the court papers. One report said the singer had broken the news to her husband via a mobile phone text message.

The couple’s marriage was greeted by a widespread media frenzy, aided by the pair’s self-filmed reality show, entitled Britney & Kevin: Chaotic. The speculation culminated in June when Spears was pilloried after appearing on television to deny there were problems in the pair’s relationship.

Sporting a tight low-cut pink top and tiny denim mini skirt, messy hair and clumped mascara, the then-heavily pregnant star tearfully insisted her relationship with "amazing" Federline was "awesome".

She also defended her parenting skills, following an outcry in February when she was snapped driving with baby Sean Preston on her lap.

The couple separated temporarily last year after Spears reportedly lost patience with her husband’s drinking, gambling and visits to strip clubs.

Federline recently relaunched his career as a rap singer and actor, with the financial backing of his wife. He has traded heavily on his association with Spears, and his first single included the lyrics: "Don’t hate me because I’m a superstar, and I’m married to a superstar."

And on Monday, the day Spears filed the divorce papers, he told Canadian interviewers his wife had been a huge supporter of his musical efforts. "She’s probably my No 1 fan, you know what I’m saying? We work together as a team and that’s what we do," he said.

But speaking last night, he struck a different tone in a brief reference to the impending split during a performance in Chicago.

"I’ve been seeing a lot of fine ladies – you know who’s about to be a free man?" he asked a few hundred audience members, many of whom attended the show without paying after tickets were given out free because of poor sales.

Just before the divorce was announced, Spears made a surprise appearance on the David Letterman chat show, which some have speculated was intended as a precursor to the news, paving the way for a relaunch of the single sex symbol.

Spears made a quick, apparently unscheduled visit to the New York studio, popping onto the set to greet Letterman. She sported a new, shorter haircut and wore an eye-poppingly short mini-dress that showed off her new svelte figure. There was no mention of the divorce, but noticeably, the star was not wearing her wedding ring.

The marriage was Spears’s second. Her first, to her childhood friend Jason Alexander, was annulled 55 hours after they married at the Little White Wedding Chapel during a trip to Las Vegas.

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