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Tbecame clear the manager was able to withstand losing against Grimsby. He weathered a decisive continental showpiece versus a particularly poor Tottenham teams for many years. He withstood home defeats against West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, the tactical inflexibility, undermining some of the club’s most promising homegrown talent, a poor winning percentage, labeling his team the worst in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed a single opponent with whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to tango. If you challenge the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, like many a Premiership right-back in Blackburn’s title-winning campaign, the coach took on Jason Wilcox and seems to have missed. The most casual observer can see the irony here: a manager who often railed at his players for failing in one-on-one duels succumbing in the face of the intense pressure and formidable presence of a England's top division's most feared sporting directors.

In truth, this entire painful saga appears to portray Jason Wilcox in a different perspective. It may have been tempting, based on his brief stint in a similar role with the Saints, to view him as merely a functionary within the club's structure: a man whose appointment was due largely to his close relationship with ex-colleague Omar Berrada rather than any demonstrable skill. How wrong we all were. In brilliantly outsmarting United’s feted manager, as he outmanoeuvred the unfortunate Dan Ashworth earlier, he has proved himself as one of the sport’s true generals: a strategic mind that the club's competitors are now rightly wary.

A Strategic Conflict Over Formation and Ideology

To illustrate, it was the director who having been part of the hierarchy that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist the coach in the first place, was instrumental in attempting to convince Amorim to abandon his beloved formation. Unsurprisingly, these pleas met a certain resistance. However, such directives hold greater authority when delivered by a man of a man the impeccable soccer background of Jason Wilcox, holder of international appearances and a role in a championship team decades past.

Maybe eventually he might agree to explain his reasoning publicly. Maybe one day he might be asked why Amorim is departing with full compensation, without any penalty clause in place. The director speaks rarely in public, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals of this sport – individuals such as him – function at a level beyond our own mundane comprehension. If he ever did speak, most likely we would perceive would be ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Desiring an explanation is not quite equivalent to being prepared to receive.

An Ultimate Authority In Command

Naturally, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we overlook the true genius behind the modern United throne. Jason Wilcox is, after all, merely executing the directives of his line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who privately has made very clear his desire for a four-man defense. According to reports, the owner has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo as a right wing-back. Ratcliffe is keen for the club to embrace data science and metrics. Per reports, in an executive meeting soon after his minority ownership, he announced that the team's approach to football “will be determined by this group”.

Ultimately, Sir Jim is an expert in these intricate footballing stuff, leveraging his previous experience in petrochemicals and sailing. Most importantly he remains incredibly rich, and as we all know, the rich are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, more tactically astute, simply superior. Who else could one trust to oversee an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the construction of a modern arena that looks similar to someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

The Modern Football Order: Executives Over Managers

This represents a shift that is becoming prevalent in top-tier football. For decades, teams mistakenly delegated major sporting choices to low-level employees like managers, talent spotters – even footballers. Perhaps it was once feasible for a young, visionary coach with a philosophy and drive to join a club and see their vision through to completion. But how many companies have such individuals set up? What number of mass redundancies have they overseen? Far preferable to invest the real power where it rightly belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with impressive LinkedIn profiles. It is wiser to determine the tactics by the directors and appoint a coach who can tailor their offering accordingly. If coaches were once chefs, they have become more like delivery personnel: not really creating the food, but still finally accountable should it be delivered cold or fails of the box.

Nowadays, a coach's role has become not about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing it: the receptionist on the front desk, the public face of an organisation they have minimal power to change. A coach at Chelsea takes a squad of literal children into the Champions League and wins domestic cups, and effectively is dismissed for talking. Wilfried Nancy finds his standing damaged while those individuals who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

The Neoliberal Game: Responsibility Only for the Few

And possibly in a small way this represents neoliberalism in action: the elevation of a privileged overclass who are infallible, whose decisions remain untouchable, whose errors can always be resolved by sacking without justification. Hire the 3-4-3 coach and then fire him for playing too much 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and then discard them for taking too long. And above all be grateful; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the reality that the adults – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.