Misano MotoGP: Dovizioso and Lorenzo one-two for Ducati on Friday

Rossi and Marc Marquez had both ended morning practice outside the top 10, and with rain potentially arriving for both second and third practice they were at risk of missing out on making Q2 automatically.

But conditions stayed dry during the 45-minute Friday afternoon session, and it took Marquez two flying laps to beat Dovizioso's earlier benchmark and lead with a 1m32.537s.

Only Ducati wildcard Michele Pirro set a comparable laptime for most of the session, but he was also nearly half a second off the pace.

Marquez stayed on top until the final two minutes when he was finally demoted by first Lorenzo and then Dovizioso.

Dovizioso ended the session with a 1m32.198s, with Lorenzo completing a Ducati one-two.

Cal Crutchlow (LCR Honda) was narrowly pushed into third by Lorenzo, with Maverick Vinales leading Yamaha's efforts in fourth.

Works Honda rider Marquez did not improve in the end and dropped to fifth ahead of Danilo Petrucci and Alex Rins.

Like Marquez, Rossi also recovered to end the day within the top 10, but his place was in doubt until the dying stages as he was held up by Karel Abraham during one of his late laps.

But the local hero managed to improve to eighth ahead of his protege Franco Morbidelli and Johann Zarco.

Despite taking 10th, Zarco is not currently set to make it to Q2 automatically as Andrea Iannone's practice one time puts him eighth overall.

Iannone was only 16th in second practice as he was one of three riders to crash at the Turn 15 left-hander, alongside Scott Redding and Takaaki Nakagami.

Hafizh Syahrin and Jack Miller also suffered their second falls in as many sessions.

KTM's Pol Espargaro, returning from injury, languished down in 24th, only beating Syahrin and MotoGP debutant Christophe Ponsson - who cut his first practice deficit by one-and-a-half seconds and was 5.9s off the pace, putting himself within the 107% limit.

FP2 times