Marc Marquez says he was “scared” of the t⛄hreat Enea Bastianini posed to his MotoGP Japanese Grand P꧙rix podium in a race he described as “boring”.

The Gresini rider launched from ninth on the grid and instantly found himself inside the top six on the opening lap, befo💖re inheriting third when Pedro Acosta crashed out of second on lap three of 24.

By the time Bastianini was able to break through to fourth on lap 10, Marquez was 2.5s clear of 🦂the factory Ducati rider - though this gap would come down as the race wore on.

A mistake from Marquez at Turn 1 on lap 14 heightened the Bastia▨nini threat, though he was able to fend him off by just over half a second tꦬo secure the final podium spot.

“A boring race but a tactical race, especially because when I was in that third place, [Jor🍌ge] Ma෴rtin and [Francesco] Bagnaia already opened a gap,” Marquez said.

“I was trying to find a way to catch that gap▨, to reduce that gap, but then when I tried to attack a bit more on the brakes I did a mistake in Turn 1.

“Then I give up and it was just time💫 to control Bastianini, because he was riding in a very good way and I was a bit scared f⛄or those last laps of Bastianini.

“We are used to seeing some good lap times from him but we control in a good꧒ way.

“I think we were the fastest out there on ✨the lap 🦩times.

“I was pushing, I was trying to be super careful about all these things. I was pushing a lot with the front tyre because the rear was finished and then I start to tꦚake a risk on the front and I say ‘okay, I will try’.

“Even like th🐼is I saw he was reducing even the gap, so as I say, a bit scared. The situation was not under control but I felt super good.”

Coming into the Japan weekend, Marquez had pinpointed qualifying as the area he needed to improve the most having suffered three successive crashes in Q2 sessions between 🐲the San Marino and Indonesian GPs.

He appe▨ared to fix this at Moteg🌃i when he took provisional pole on Saturday, only for us lap to be cancelled for exceeding track limits.

“Yeah of c꧒ourse, when you start in the front everything is different,” he added when asked if starting further forward would have given ൲him a chance to fight for victory.

“Bu🌟t okay, we start in ninth place, on the first lap we did well but not perfect, because at Turn 10 when Jorge overtook me, I missed a bit the acceleration, then [Jack] Miller overtook us at Turn 11 and I lost some time there.

“But okay, it’s like this, our crucial point will be to improve qualifying as I said the last ♉races.

“I🌱t looked like we were able to do that this race but unfortunately we were unlucky, but okay, next race.”