Enea Bastianini has b🎃een backed by his Ducat💛i boss to compete for the 2024 MotoGP championship.

He was forced to watch on last season as factory Ducati teammate Francesco Bagnaia 🦄edged Pramac’s Jorge Martin and VR46’s Marco Bezzecchi to win a second consecutive tဣitle.

It was Bastianini’s first season in factory red but it was blighted by injury, the first and most se🌠vere o༺f which was suffered on the first weekend of 2023.

But Bastianini was the fastest rider ꧟on Day 2 of the preseason Sepang test to lay down a marker that he could return to the title picture to join Bagnaia, Martin, Bezzecchi and maybe even Marc Marquez.

“Enea is absolutely ♋⭕over the moon,” said Ducati team manager Davide Tardozzi.

“After the really bad year that he had last year - struggling for confidence with the bike, ✤all the injuries, 𝓡the accident in the first race at Portimao - it was something really heavy on his shoulders.

“He hadܫ a good race here, winning in Malaysia, but he was struggling u♏ntil the end in Valencia.

“Now, he’s aಞnother rider. He is the Enea Bastianini that♈ we saw in 2022.

“We are really confident that he will 🍸be one of the contenders.”

Bastianini, in 2022 with Gresini, won the second-most amount of grands prix behind Bagnaia. They fought wheel-to-wheel in the closing rounds to earn Bastianini a promotion to the fac🐽tory team above Martin.

“I have to thank Pecco and Enea for they work in the team with the engineers,” Tardozzi saidꦓ in൩ Sepang.

“I see how many ideas th�🌊�ey exchange between them. They talk about new parts.

“There is confidence between the two. This helps the engin𝓡eers.🌊”

Broadcaster Simon Crafar added: “You know the Enea that we saw at the race in Qatar, he won💯.

“Day 1 of the official test, that was the Enea who turned 📖up.

“Wow, he was straight-away on it! Some ride🉐rs took half a day to get the rust off.

“Enea just turned up and bang!

“The new enginꦏe, he’s made friends with straight away. The new bike seems like it suits him better.

“The big thing, for me, for Ducati? They seem confident with the 𝄹whole package.

“It will only be little tweaks. But it looks like💞 it works.”

Tardozzi said about Ducati’s winter development: “We don’t want to make a revolution as we did in 2022, when we were forced to run behind the problems of💟 the first winter test.

“In 2022 a♏nd ‘23, we struggled. Now we have learned from the past.

“Gigi and the guys did a fantastic job.”

Bastianini, Bagnaia and Martin have already insisted that the GP24 feels even better than last year’s bike♛, which dominated MotoGP.