{"id":99323,"date":"2025-08-27T09:29:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-27T09:29:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/99323\/"},"modified":"2025-08-27T09:29:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-27T09:29:08","slug":"franco-morbidelli-shares-how-he-would-feel-if-valentino-rossi-replaced-him-at-vr46-amid-pedro-acosta-links","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/99323\/","title":{"rendered":"Franco Morbidelli shares how he would feel if Valentino Rossi replaced him at VR46 amid Pedro Acosta links"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Franco Morbidelli is one of a few riders out of contract at the end of the 2025 MotoGP season.<\/p>\n

The Italian is the only Ducati<\/a> rider yet to be tied down for 2026. Morbidelli<\/a> linked up with close friend Valentino Rossi<\/a> and signed with his VR46<\/a> team after leaving Pramac at the end of last year.<\/p>\n

Riding the GP24, the 30-year-old has put in some solid performances in 2025. Despite missing two races through injury after a nasty crash at Sachsenring, he has consistently finished in the points and has grabbed two podiums.<\/p>\n

Sitting seven points ahead of teammate Fabio Di Giannantonio<\/a>, who is on the factory GP25 bike, the Italian has done nothing to suggest that he should be replaced. However, Dorna have suggested to VR46 to replace Morbidelli<\/a> amid links to KTM<\/a> star Pedro Acosta<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"FrancoPhoto by Emmanuele Ciancaglini\/Ciancaphoto Studio\/Getty ImagesFranco Morbidelli would not \u2018hold a grudge\u2019 if Valentino Rossi decided to replace him at VR46<\/p>\n

VR46 have been linked with Acosta<\/a> throughout 2025 when it was rumoured that the Spaniard was trying to break his KTM contract. Frustrated over the manufacturer\u2019s financial crisis and the tricky nature of the RC16, he was supposedly keen to leave, with Ducati being his preferred destination.<\/p>\n

However, KTM \u2018restricted\u2019 Acosta\u2019s contract<\/a> from having an exit clause, which prevents him from leaving until 2027. But the noise surrounding the Spaniard and his links to VR46 would not have been what Morbidelli wanted to hear.<\/p>\n

Asked about Acosta\u2019s ties to VR46, he told AS<\/a>: \u201cI couldn\u2019t focus too much on how close this was to being true. During the GP, you can\u2019t think about that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe hottest period was Mugello and Assen, when he wanted to talk on TV with the image of the VR46 behind him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked how he would feel about leaving VR46, he added: \u201cI love my bike very much, but I love the team and these colors more, and if I can\u2019t give the team what it deserves, and Uccio [Salucci] or Vale think someone else can give more to these colors than me, I wouldn\u2019t have a problem or hold a grudge.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0Everything to know about Franco Morbidelli from net worth to career stats<\/a><\/p>\n

\"KTMPhoto by Gold & Goose Photography\/Getty ImagesPedro Acosta caused drama with Fabio Di Giannantonio amid VR46 links<\/p>\n

As Morbidelli mentioned, things got slightly heated with Acosta and his links to VR46. The Spaniard was seen posing in front of the team\u2019s advertising board during media interviews at Mugello and Assen, as well as visiting the Ducati museum.<\/p>\n

Morbidelli\u2019s teammate Di Giannantonio said the rumours were \u2018not nice\u2019 for KTM<\/a> as he criticised the 21-year-old. Acosta fired back at Diggia<\/a>, telling him to see the light of the situation.<\/p>\n

Di Giannantonio doubled down on his criticism towards Acosta<\/a> as he told the KTM rider to show respect to his team. He will not leave the Austrian outfit until his contract expires in 2026, but a move to Rossi\u2019s team could still be on the cards in the future.<\/p>\n

However, Uccio Salucci thinks Acosta will reject VR46<\/a>. He believes that the Spaniard would favour a move to a factory outfit over a satellite team.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Franco Morbidelli is one of a few riders out of contract at the end of the 2025 MotoGP…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":99324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,23688,27485,806,805,803,804,10734,85,20420,20033],"class_list":{"0":"post-99323","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-motosport","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-franco-morbidelli","11":"tag-ktm-factory-racing","12":"tag-motor","13":"tag-motor-sports","14":"tag-motosport","15":"tag-motosports","16":"tag-pedro-acosta","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-valentino-rossi","19":"tag-vr46-racing-team"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}