Diogo Dalot says it is 'a joy' to work with Manchester United interim manager Ralf Rangnick and believes he is in his best moment at the club.
Dalot has started in six of United's last nine games and was named the man of the match by BT Sport co-commentator Martin Keown in the 3-1 Premier League win over Brentford.
The 22-year-old replaced the injured Aaron Wan-Bissaka at right-back in Michael Carrick's last match in caretaker charge against Arsenal last month and Dalot kept his place for Rangnick's first match when Wan-Bissaka was available.
Dalot has enjoyed a progressive 18 months since he embarked on a season-long loan at AC Milan that earned him a call-up to the Portugal national squad for the European Championship. After struggling for opportunities under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, Dalot has thrived under Rangnick, with Alex Telles also excelling at left-back.
"Obviously, we have a lot of the ball, the full-backs," Dalot told the MEN. "We want to build up from the back to the forward players, being very compact defensively.
"It’s been a joy to work with him and hopefully, we can improve, still improve in the next couple of weeks and build on from there, build the confidence. Not just me but everybody, and hopefully we can be a better team and have more and more quality games like today, especially the last half.
"Yeah, probably (this is my best moment). This is what I’ve been working for since I came here – to play more often – and it’s not easy when you play just a few games in a few months and now, with more opportunities, I think can show a bit more of myself, maybe with more confidence, give a little bit more for the team, for the club.
"Obviously, I’m still young, I need to improve in a lot of things and I have time to do that. But now I just want to keep going and help the team."
Brentford manager Thomas Frank said United were 'unbelievably lucky' the game was goalless at half-time after Brentford 'destroyed' them in a dominant first-half where David de Gea twice foiled Mathias Jensen in one-on-ones.
United were unrecognisable from at the restart and took the lead through Anthony Elanga in the 55th minute. Rangnick switched to a back three after Mason Greenwood made it 2-0, substituting Greenwood and Cristiano Ronaldo, and the strategy paid off as substitute Marcus Rashford put United 3-0 up in the 77th minute.
De Gea and centre-back Raphael Varane were key to United staying level at half-time and Dalot says he is benefiting from playing with two such esteemed players in the back five.
"We conceded some chances on the counter-attack when we shouldn’t," Dalot said of the first half. "In the second half, we were a bit more aggressive on the second balls, a bit more tempo on the counter-attacking, and a bit more clinical on the last pass and the last third. And obviously, the goals we scored were fantastic.
"As players, we need to be ready for any kind of challenge during the game, we need to be intelligent enough to understand that sometimes a new formation can really turn up quickly.
"Obviously, we went to a back five, we needed to react, we had some chances to score after we changed the formation, so that shows we can be ready for any kind of challenge during the game.
"We are fortunate to have fantastic players in the squad. Obviously, when you play back-to-back games, it gets a little bit easier, more confidence between players and it’s obviously fantastic to be playing with such high-quality players (as De Gea and Varane). That’s what Man United is about: being high-level players, high quality and we just need to keep on going like we did today."
Ronaldo became United's first Portuguese player in 2003 and Fernandes is the sixth and most recent after Dalot. The trio are expected to remain in the side for the visit of West Ham on Saturday and, while Dalot is learning from playing alongside his compatriots, he believes they can also learn from him.
"They are probably two of the best Portuguese players we have now," he added. "To to be in the squad with two high-quality players, it’s a joy to me and I just need to keep learning from them, try to help them and I’m sure they will learn something from me as well. This is how it works.
"As a Portuguese player, it’s a very proud moment for me to play alongside them."
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