Needing to beat Francesco Bagnaia by at least three points at Sepang this weekend just to stay in the title fight, a ༺crestfallen Espargaro managed ♓just five laps in opening practice after problems with both his RS-GPs.

“A difficult beginning to the most important weekend of the season so far,” he said. “I had a big problem with the clutch in bike one. I stopped after one lap, then I restarted and crashed immediate♏ly because of this problem.

“The🎉n with the second bike I did just one out-lap and then I had an alarm on the dash and had to stop. It was related to the engine, but I cannot really comment anymore.

“I couldn't continue with that bike [due to] t🅘he engine, so I watched the session from my garage!

“Then in the ♐afternoon it rained so… difficult to say something about today🍌.”

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‘It seems for journalists and Aprilia I was too critical’

Asked how frustrating the Friday situation was, given his recent 'critical' comments about 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:how the team must er🍬adicate such mist🥀akes to fight for the MotoGP title, Espargaro said:

“I was a littl♉e bit critical with our performance in generꦉal, with the team performance, at the last races. And looks like for the journalists and for Aprilia I was too critical.

“Today you can analyse my Free P🃏ractice 1, it is how it is, 🌳the results [problems] are there.

“We are in the second part of the championship. We are not🅘 at the level that we've been in the first part and I can’t d♔o anything else.

“I really believe in this team and I really believe that next year we can fight again for the title if we do🐽 th▨e same things we did in the first part of the championship, without any doubt.

“Actually if I did more or less sౠimilar [results] from the first part of the championship, I would be leading now. So hopefully we can learn from this.”

Quizzed on why he thinks there has been such 🍬a downturn in points, the Spaniard replied cryptically:

“I know perfectly. It's the third year that we've had these problems actually, with both riders slower in the second pﷺart of the championship, but it's somethi💦ng that we have to discuss internally.”

Declining to ex⛦plain exactly what he believes the issue is, Espargaܫro revealed that it’s not “super difficult to fix” and “can also be” related to bike development during the season.

“Du🍸ring the season, if you analyse also the top speed from beginning until now, I can't overtake nobody in the straight [now]. And in the beginning of the season, the Aprilia was very fast and overtook in the straight quite easy…”

‘Next year we'll be even better’

Espargaro, who like team-mate Maverick Vinales has signed to remainꦆ at Aprilia for the next two seasons, insists this year won’t be a one-off MotoGP title challenge and that 2023 can be ‘even better’.

“Aprilia learned a lot this year, how to manage the pressure of being in the top of the championship. They bring a super competitive bike. Also, me as a rider, I learned a lot how to ride with pressure, to fight for the podium, for the victories, for pole pos🔯itions," he said.

“So I have the feeling that next year will not be the same, but eve♏n better. 100% sure.

“But for me it's important to be more constant. I didn't ha🌳ve the speed in the second part of the championship. We did many mistakes and I don't feel❀ the bike as competitive as it was in the first part of the championship, when a lot of people were saying that the Aprilia was the best bike. And now it's not the worst one, but it's not the same.”

Espargaro add🍌ed: “I'm very proud of what we achieved this year. The bike is completely in another level to all the other versions of the RS-GP. This bike is very competitive.

“But I feel that it's not enough to fight for the title, even if we are almost in the end of the season and we have still some possibilitie🌠s. But for sure we will learn about this. I'm re✃ally convinced 100% that next year will be better than this.”

Honesty the best policy

“I think the team 𝔍love me because I'm really honest, just like when I’ve said to them, ‘congratulations, ﷺthe bike is fantastic’," Espargaro said of his straight-talking nature.

“I remember back 🀅🎐in 2021 here in Malaysia, when I tried the bike two years ago, the big revolution, I was crying when I came in the pits. Because I felt it from the bottom of my heart.

“But when I'm critical with them it’s because🌄 I want to push them more because I feel they are able to do better. We are not at the level of 🐼the last races.”

Espargaro went on to finish 21st in the damp FP2 session and, like Bagnaia (11th), must now hope for dry weathಞer in FP3 to have a chance of breaking into the topꦅ ten for direct access to Qualifying 2.

Team-mate Maverick Vinales also had a diꦓfficult start to the weekend with 19th in FP1, then took sixth in FP2.