Rangnick told 'world class' De Gea makes Man Utd "look better than they are"

Ralf Rangnick will be able to take plenty of positives from his first two Premier League games as Manchester United interim boss, but has been told goalkeeper David de Gea is making the Red Devils look better than they are.

The Spanish shot-stopper has been in stellar form in recent weeks, particularly during Saturday evening's hard-fought 1-0 away win at Norwich City.

It was exactly the kind of close game that was always going to be separated by who had the stronger backline, De Gea pulling off a number of superb saves to thwart every attack from Dean Smith's side.

Analysing the shot-stopper's performance for the BBC, former United forward Garth Crooks claimed Rangnick has his goalkeeper to thank for making the trip from Carrow Road back to Manchester with all three points.

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"If the save from Teemu Pukki was top class then the one from Ozan Kabak's header was world class," Crooks explained.

"This is the second Manchester United league performance I have seen under Ralf Rangnick and without De Gea in goal they would have lost them both.

"He is in the most brilliant form and once again United's best player. There's still a lot of work to do with this team, especially in defence, but De Gea is making them look better than they actually are."

While the first 45 minutes at Carrow Road so both teams apply very little pressure, Norwich started to take the game to their visitors after the half-time interval.

De Gea was forced into action a number of times both before and after Cristiano Ronaldo won United the game from the penalty spot after he was adjudged to have been fouled by Max Aarons with 15 minutes left to play.

Rangnick was hardly glowing in his review of United's performance after the full-time whistle.

"It was a very intense game, very physical. They played well, they didn't play like a bottom team," the 63-year-old explained to Match of the Day.

"We had some problems in the first 15 minutes. From the start we controlled the game but didn't always have the best possible solutions.

"At half time I told the boys we needed to increase the speed and intensity of the game.

"The second half was a little bit better but at the end we were lucky to have a clean sheet and there were two or three clean sheets by David De Gea, it's another clean sheet but still a lot of work to do."

United's next league fixtures comes in the form of a trip to Brentford, though there are fears over the game going ahead due to a recent Covid-19 outbreak among Red Devils ranks.