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Itranspired the manager was able to withstand losing against Grimsby. Survive losing a crucial continental showpiece versus one of the worst Tottenham teams for many years. He could survive home defeats to domestic rivals, finishing 15th, an unwavering system, squandering the team's most promising homegrown talent, the 32% win rate, labeling his team the poorest the club has ever seen. But there was a single opponent against whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to tango. If you challenge the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, similar to numerous Premiership defender in Blackburn’s championship 1994-95 season, the coach took on Jason Wilcox and seems to have missed. The most distracted of readers can see the paradoxical situation: a coach who frequently berated at his players for failing in individual battles succumbing in the face of the white heat and formidable presence of one of England's top division's most feared sporting directors.

In truth, this whole bruising episode appears to portray the director in a different perspective. Perhaps it might have been easy, based on his brief stint of experience with the Saints, to regard him as little more than a drudge in the United exoskeleton: a man whose appointment was due largely to his friendship with his former boss Omar Berrada as any demonstrable skill. How wrong we all were. By masterfully outsmarting United’s feted manager, just as he bested the unfortunate a previous executive before him, he has demonstrated as one of the sport’s strategic masterminds: a strategic mind of which the club's mid-table rivals will now be justifiably concerned.

The Strategic Conflict Over System & Ideology

For example, this was the director , after having been part of the leadership that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim in the first place, was instrumental in trying to persuade Amorim to ditch his beloved 3-4-3. Naturally, these pleas met a certain resistance. But perhaps these judgements hold greater authority when delivered from the mouth of a man the impeccable soccer background he possesses, holder of international appearances and a contributor to a championship team decades past.

Maybe eventually he may be persuaded to outline his reasoning to the rest of us. Maybe one day he might be asked why Amorim is departing with a full payout, with no compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks in public, and with very good reason. The real thinkers of this sport – individuals such as him – simply operate at a level beyond our own mundane comprehension. If he ever did speak, probably all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not quite equivalent to being prepared to receive.

An Ultimate Authority In Command

But of course, by focusing our attention on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the real power behind the club's current leadership. The director is, in reality, simply carrying out the directives of his ultimate superior Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has made very clear his desire for a four-man defense. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also proposed deploying the forward in a wing-back role. Ratcliffe is keen for United to adopt data science and analytics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his investment, he declared that United’s style of play “will be decided in this room”.

Ultimately, Sir Jim is an expert in these intricate football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and yachting. Above all he is immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the wealthy are the best of us: more perceptive, more wise, strategically brilliant, fundamentally better. Who else would you trust to oversee a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the construction of a modern arena that appears a lot like an abstract design, the signing of Benjamin Sesko?

The Modern Football Hierarchy: Executives Above Coaches

This is a trend that is becoming prevalent in top-tier of the game. For decades, teams mistakenly entrusted major sporting choices to subordinate staff such as coaches, talent spotters – even footballers. Perhaps it was once feasible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and drive to go into a club and implement their plan supported to fruition. Yet how many companies have such individuals set up? How many large-scale layoffs have they managed? Better by far to place the real power where it rightly belongs: the executive class, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with the jaw-dropping professional resumes. Better by far to decide the strategy in the boardroom and appoint a coach who can tailor their offering to suit. If managers were once chefs, they are now more like delivery personnel: not creating the food, but still finally accountable should it be delivered poorly or leaks out of the box.

Nowadays, a coach's role is increasingly less about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the visible figurehead of an organisation they have minimal power to influence. Enzo Maresca leads a team of very young players into Europe and wins two medium-sized trophies, and effectively is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic finds his reputation ruined while those individuals who appointed him continue to make errors indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Football: Responsibility Only for the Few

And possibly in a small way this represents corporate governance in action: the elevation of a privileged overclass who can never be wrong, whose decisions remain sacrosanct, whose mistakes can always be sacked away without explanation. Hire the system coach only to dismiss them for playing too much that system. Hire the project manager and later discard him for requiring too long. And most importantly be grateful; for your modest increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the reality that the adults – however well qualified – remain in control.