Marco Bezzecchi: I tried to pass Quartararo but...

With Bagnaia inheriting the race lead ahead of Enea Bastianini, if fellow Ducati rider Bezzecchi could overtake Fabio Quartararo for third it would hand Bagnaia the 2022 world championship.

Bezzecchi, who had charged through from eleventh on the opening lap, looked in with an excellent chance of settling the title as he lined up an attack on the Monster Yamaha.

But the Frenchman proved tough to outbrake, while the mid-race battle between Bagnaia and Bastianini prompted Quartararo to up his pace and pull away from the VR46 rider.

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“In the start I lost some positions [at turn one], and this created some problems with my rear tyre management, because to recover the positions, I had to push more than I wanted to do,” explained rookie of the year Bezzecchi, who had qualified fourth.

“Then when I got close to Fabio, I tried to overtake him immediately, but he was braking very strongly and I was already starting to feel a little bit in trouble with the front tyre.

“So I couldn't pass him, and when I stayed one and a half laps behind him, I started to struggle with the front pressure, so then I had to lose some metres.

“At the same moment, Bastianini passed Pecco, and when Bastianini passed Pecco, they were slower.

“So Fabio in that moment of the race, pushed a little bit more to try to close the gap.

“I was already a little bit on the limit with the tyres, so I tried to push as well, but I was not able to follow him, and I started to lose two tenths, two tenths, two tenths…

“Then for the last laps I didn't want to risk a mistake, because it was anyway a fourth place.”

Bagnaia went on to win by just 0.270s from Bastianini, with Quartararo 2.5s further back in third and Bezzecchi 2.7s from the reigning champion in fourth.

Bagnaia was therefore left two points short of settling the world championship at Sepang but will take a near unbeatable 23-point lead over Quartararo into the Valencia finale.

Bezzecchi is 14th in the world championship, but now just 5 points behind team-mate Luca Marini, who suffered his first MotoGP DNF after his holeshot device failed to release at the start of Sunday's race.