Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso has admitted he has been unable to remain a constant threat to Marc Marquez in the 2019 MotoGP race and can only challenge the little Spaniard ‘in flashes’.

Dovizioso is 98 points behind the Honda man but is, amazingly, on course to finish runner-up in the title chase again after nicking two wins from Marquez this season.

But the Italian also has two non-finishes on his balance sheet with a host of results off the podium. Marquez, on the other hand, has either won or finished second this year, with one non-finish.

I am not one who finds excuses and I don’t want to start now. But when free zeroes arrive in the championship, that don’t depend on you, it changes everything,” said Dovizioso, referring to the Barcelona crash caused by an errant Jorge Lorenzo.

Until Barcelona we were behind, but close. The incident there cut off our legs, but anyway we were not close to Marc like last year.

“We were only able to challenge him in flashes in the middle part of the season, then the crash at Silverstone happened.

“But don’t want to say that without those two incidents I would be able to challenge Marc, because we only finished ahead of him in Austria.

“This is the reality and we have to be better in certain aspects that we are aware of. But nobody at the moment is beating Marc, so we [all] have to find some solutions.”