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Tbecame clear Ruben Amorim endured a loss to lower-league opposition. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece against a particularly poor Tottenham teams in living memory. He could survive home defeats against West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, undermining the team's most promising homegrown talent, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed one adversary against whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to tango. If you challenge Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight defender in Blackburn’s title-winning campaign, Amorim came at Jason Wilcox and appears to have missed. The most casual observer can see the paradoxical situation: a coach who frequently berated his squad for losing individual battles crumbling in the face of the intense pressure and animal charisma of one of the Premier League’s most intimidating sporting directors.

And frankly, this whole painful saga seems to paint Jason Wilcox in a different perspective. It may have been tempting, based on his nine months of experience with the Saints, to view him as little more than a drudge within the club's structure: an individual who owed his position largely to his friendship with ex-colleague a fellow executive rather than any verifiable talent. How wrong we all were. In brilliantly outsmarting United’s feted manager, as he outmanoeuvred the unfortunate a previous executive earlier, he has proved himself as one of the sport’s strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect of which the club's competitors are now rightly wary.

The Strategic Conflict Over System and Ideology

For example, it was the director , after having been part of the hierarchy that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim originally, was instrumental in attempting to convince him to abandon his favored formation. Naturally, these entreaties were resisted. But perhaps these judgements carry more weight when delivered from the mouth with the impeccable soccer background he possesses, a veteran of three England caps and a role in a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time he might agree to outline his thought processes to the rest of us. Maybe one day questions may arise regarding why the coach is walking away with full compensation, with no compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks in public, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals of this sport – individuals such as him – function at a level exceeding our mundane comprehension. Were he to speak, most likely all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Desiring an explanation is not equivalent to being prepared to comprehend it.

An Supreme Authority In Command

But of course, in training our focus on the sporting director we overlook the real power behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, in reality, merely executing the commands of his ultimate line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has made very clear his preference for a back four. According to reports, the owner has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for United to adopt data science and metrics. According to ESPN, during a leadership summit soon after his minority ownership, he announced that United’s style to football “shall be decided in this room”.

Ultimately, Sir Jim is an expert in this technical football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and sailing. Above all he is incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are the best of us: more perceptive, more wise, strategically brilliant, simply superior. Who else would you trust to manage a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the construction of a modern arena that appears a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of a new striker?

The Modern Soccer Hierarchy: Executives Over Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels of the game. Historically, clubs foolishly delegated big footballing decisions to low-level employees such as coaches, talent spotters – players themselves. Maybe previously feasible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with a philosophy and drive to go into a club and see their vision supported to fruition. But how many companies have such individuals established? What number of large-scale layoffs have they managed? Better by far to place genuine authority where it rightly belongs: the executive class, the casually dressed executives, the individuals with impressive professional resumes. It is wiser to decide the strategy by the directors and appoint a coach who can tailor their offering accordingly. If coaches were once chefs, they are now more akin to delivery personnel: not really creating the food, yet finally accountable should it be delivered poorly or fails of the box.

In the meantime, their job is increasingly less about defining the vision and more about marketing it: the receptionist on the front desk, the public face for a club they can do little to change. Enzo Maresca leads a team of very young players into the Champions League and wins domestic cups, and essentially gets sacked for speaking out. A manager at Celtic finds his reputation ruined whereas those individuals who hired him continue to make errors another day.

A Neoliberal Football: Accountability for the Few

And possibly on some microcosmic level this represents neoliberalism in action: the elevation of a privileged overclass who are infallible, whose choices are always sacrosanct, whose errors can always be resolved by sacking without justification. Hire the 3-4-3 coach and then fire him for playing excessively 3-4-3. Hire the process guy and later bin them for requiring too long. And above all show gratitude; for your modest increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the fact that the adults – however well qualified – are in charge.