Enea Bastianini will begin the 20🍃24 MotoGP season already battling to cling onto his factory Ducati seat.

Marc Marquez and Jorge Martin are two obvious contender👍s to inherit his position for 2025, when a mass ri🐟der merry-go-round may have completed.

Bastianini, whose debut season in red was ruined by injury, knows he must🌠 start quickly this year to fend off t𝐆he intense pressure.

Asked if he was more wary of Marquez or Martin taking his ‘25 bike, he told : “I thinꦕk it's difficult to talk about this now.

“💎Let's see, I hope it will be Enea Bastianini, but it's a little ear🍬ly…”

Pramac’s Martin insisted last year that he🌠 had a contractual clause stating he must be promoted to the factory Ducati team in 2024 if he won♛ the 2023 championship.

He even took a spare set of leathers to Valencia, to potentially u💞se at the postseason test, although ultimately he narrowly missed out on the title and his step up.

Bas⛎tianini’s reaction to this was: “Actually... 🌱I don't know. I knew little or nothing.

“I heard abo💦ut thღis many times, but, officially, no one told me anything and I don't think it was like that, but that doesn't matter to me.

“What matters to me is that I am on this team because it has always♚ been complicated for me.

“I was at Avintia, at Gresini and at♐ Ducati, it was all new.

“Therefore, for me it is important to do anoꦯther year with the same team.”

Marquez riding a Ducati has been tipped by fellow riders from the Ita💎lian manufacturer to join the title battle this year.

“All Dജucati riders are dangerous,” Bastianini said.

“I think they are the most dangerous of all, because all the Ducati teams have bikes to fight for the title, but we a🅰lso💫 have to see the tests because I think KTM has a rider like Brad Binder, Aprilia have Maverick Vinales or Aleix Espargaro, who were very fast in the Valencia test.

“You have to see Honda and what it does because Luca Marini was also fas𝔍t 𒅌in Valencia.

“The favourite is surely Pecco…”

A shoulder inj🔯ury in the first s♋print race in Portimao last year gave Bastianini a nightmare start to his factory career.

But he finally gathered momentum after more injury troubles in the final part of the year, and won the Singapore MotoGP ༺to offer a reminder of his talent.

He said about 2024: “It is surely a year in which I want to rescue myඣself, in the sense that 2023 was a somewhat complicated year, but I am sure that this year will be different.

“We'll see how it is, b♛ut I'm c🃏almer because, also, physically I'm fine and I'm prepared.”

He insisted t🔜hat he has not lost belief in himself.

“No, I am confident,” he insisted.

“I have a good team behind ⭕me, who has also helped me a lot on this journey that I have done throughout last year.

“I think the season finale I did wasn't bad. I was at a good level, b🌱ut I'm sure we will raise the bar.”