Diogo Dalot : An Exciting Prospect

If you're a 19 year old defender and Jose Mourinho buys you for 19 million, you must be something special. This time the name was Diogo Dalot. Growing up in a musician family, Dalot's love of football dates back to his childhood, and his family never stopped him. At the age of 6, Dalot started his journey to become a footballer from a local youth academy. Dalot was extremely talented from the very beginning, so 6 year old Dalot was played with boys 2-3 years older than him. At that time, Dalot came to the attention of the Academy Scouts of several big clubs in Portugal. Porto, Sporting Lisbon, Benfica are the three teams that gave him the opportunity to try. Dalot chose Porto because Porto was relatively close to hometown. After joining the Porto Academy at the age of 9, Dalot got the chance to play for the Porto B team in 2017. Dalot also made his Porto senior debut that year. After playing only 8 matches in the Porto senior team in the 2017-18 season, he kept coming to the attention of big clubs in the 2018 summer window. Clubs such as Barcelona and Real Madrid also scouted him, but Manchester United signed him for 19 million pounds. Jose Mourinho was keen to sign Dalot.

Dalot's Manchester United career began with a match against the Young Boys in the champions league. He made his Premier League debut with Southampton in December 2018. Although Jose Mourinho was sacked that season, then interim manager Ole played him for the rest of the season. Despite being unavailable for most of the season due to injury, Dalot played 23 matches for United in his first season, of which 16 were in the Premier League. The most memorable match of that season was the away match against PSG in the champions league Round of Sixteen. In the 90th minute of that match, Manchester United were awarded a penalty for a shot taken by Diego Dalot to the hands of PSG centerback Kimpembe, which led to United reaching the quarter finals of the champions league. Although he got some gametime in the first season, things changed in the second season. With the purchase of Wan Bissaka at the beginning of the 2019-20 season, his game time was reduced drastically. That season, Dalot scored the first goal in United's jersey. In the FA Cup against the Tranmere Rovers. Manchester United sent Dalot to AC Milan on loan in the 2020-21 season for gametime due to Wan Bissaka and academy's Brandon Williams. It became a turning point for Dalot. He was always criticized for being good at attacking but defensively weak. Which he improved in AC Milan. Arriving there, Dalot became an integral part of Stefano Pioli's team. In one season's loan, Dalot played 33 matches and scored 2 goals and 3 assists. Due to his versatility, he backed Milan as both left back and right back. AC Milan were runners up in the Serie A, losing in the Round of 16 of the Europa League to Dalot's parent club Manchester United.

At the start of the 2021-22 season, several teams expressed interest in signing Dalot, but United were reluctant to sell him. Although under Ole, Dalot was neglected. He made it to the starting XI in just two matches. Many have speculated that Dalot's time in United may have come to an end, but Dalot has been reborn after Ralph took over. After Rangnik's arrival, Dalot impressed Rangnik with a place in the starting XI in the first two matches, becoming United's first choice right back. Even though he has played 22 matches so far this season, he wasn't involved in any kind of goal. Dalot's improvement is very clear. Offensively, Dalot offers a lot more than Bissaka, and even defensively his improvement is noticeable. If the graph of this improvement of Dalot continues to go upwards, United will benefit. There is definitely something special about him. The 23 year old Dalot will look forward to secure United's right back position for a long time to come.