Factory Ducati's Andrea Dovizioso believes he should be able to qualify well for this weekend's MotoGP opener at Qatar but remain concerned over his race pace for the desert contest.

The Italian says setup for a fast lap on new tyres is good but the gap over a full distance is still too large and requires more work from the Bologna team.

“Losail is a good track for me, as I’ve always had good races there, and I think that the Ducati’s strengths can work in Qatar. We head to this race determined to do well," said the Italian.

"We know that our pace isn’t so far from the others’ on new tyres, so we should certainly be able to fight for a good grid position, but we have a significant gap to make up in race configuration. Unfortunately we weren’t able to do a race simulation in the tests, so tyre wear is a question mark for me.”