MotoGP: Enea Bastianini lays down a big marker for 2023 at Aragon - opinion

It is hard to think of a MotoGP race this season that has had quite as big an impact on the battle for the world title, as Sunday’s Grand Prix in Aragon.

With defending champion and title leader Fabio Quartararo taken out just two corners into the race in a terrifying, but thankfully not serious in terms of injury, crash via a collision with the back of the returning Marc Marquez, Ducati’s Pecco Bagnaia’s second-place finish in that race, means the in-form Italian is now just ten points behind the Yamaha man in the battle for the title, with five races of the season to go.

As a result, the title race now looks to be wide open, with that second-place finish for Bagnaia following up four consecutive wins. It is the Ducati man who now looks to have the momentum in the title race, given Quartararo himself now has just one podium in that same time frame, and will undoubtedly be feeling the effects of that crash as the series head to the far east for the quickfire flyaways, starting in Japan this weekend.

But despite that, it could still be argued that things could have been even better for Bagnaia on Sunday, were it not for the intervention of one man, who is looking increasingly likely to himself be right in the mix for the title this time next year, in the form of Enea Bastianini.

For so long in that race on Sunday, Bagnaia looked well set for a seventh win of the season, and fifth in as many races, it would instead be his fellow Ducati rider Bastianini who claimed top spot on the podium, for the fourth time this season, and the way he did so was rather telling.

Having been the only rider capable of matching the pace of Bagnaia through the race, Bastianini then produced a remarkable piece of riding to claim victory on the