Repsol Honda's Casey Stoner has fired a jibe at old enemy Valentino Rossi while praising his team-mate Nicky Hayden on his front-row qualifying position for tomorrow's Jerez MotoGP encounter.

The reigning world champion congratulated Hayden on his performance as the Kentuckian finishes two places ahead of the Aussie, saying the Desmosedici can't be an awful bike if Hayden is able to get the results he can on it.

"We know Nicky is very good around this track, he has had some good results here. He beat me in a race and looking at the fact it's a good track for Nicky and a bad one for Ducati, it is looking good for them," said Stoner, speaking to bikesportnews.com this evening.

“I spoke with Nicky the other day. He said he's really happy with the bike, and it's probably the best he's ridden. He seems quite confident with it but from the other side of the garage you hear the complete opposite. It's encouraging to see Ducati getting good results, especially with Nicky.

"Nicky is doing a great job with it at the moment and I don't think they are too far from the pace. Last year they started the season more competitive than they ended it. We can see it is not completely the bike because Nicky is getting good results with it."