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Iturns out Ruben Amorim was able to withstand defeat by lower-league opposition. Survive an important continental showpiece versus a particularly poor Spurs sides for many years. He withstood home defeats to domestic rivals, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, laying waste to some of the club’s most promising academy products, the 32% win rate, labeling the squad the poorest the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed one adversary against whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to dance. If you challenge the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight defender in Blackburn’s title-winning 1994-95 season, the coach came at the executive and appears to have missed. Even the most casual observer can see the irony here: a coach who frequently berated at his players for losing individual battles succumbing in the face of the intense pressure and formidable presence of a England's top division's most intimidating football executives.

And frankly, this entire painful saga seems to paint the director in a different perspective. It may have been tempting, based on his nine months of experience with the Saints, to view Jason Wilcox as merely a drudge within the club's structure: an individual who owed his position as much to his close relationship with his former boss Omar Berrada as any verifiable talent. How mistaken we all were. In brilliantly outsmarting the club's celebrated head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth before him, he has proved himself as one of the sport’s true generals: a strategic mind that United’s mid-table rivals will now be justifiably concerned.

The Strategic Clash Over Formation and Ideology

For example, this was the director , after having been part of the leadership that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim in the first place, played a key role in attempting to convince Amorim to abandon his favored 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties were resisted. However, such directives carry more weight when issued from the mouth of a man the impeccable soccer background he possesses, holder of three England caps and a contributor to a title-winning side decades past.

Maybe eventually Jason Wilcox might agree to outline his thought processes to the rest of us. Maybe one day questions may arise regarding why the coach is departing with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause in place. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely in public, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals in football – men like Jason Wilcox – simply operate at a level exceeding our prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, probably we would perceive is a series of ultrasonic blips and complex calculations. Wanting is not quite equivalent to being ready to comprehend it.

The Ultimate Authority In Command

But of course, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the real power behind the modern United throne. The director is, in reality, merely executing the directives of his ultimate superior Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has made very clear his preference for a four-man defense. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for United to embrace data science and analytics. According to ESPN, during a leadership summit soon after his minority ownership, he declared that United’s style to football “shall be decided by this group”.

After all, Sir Jim is an expert in these intricate football matters, leveraging his previous experience in petrochemicals and yachting. Above all he is incredibly rich, and as we all know, the rich are the best of us: more perceptive, more wise, more tactically astute, fundamentally better. Who else could one trust to manage a strategic plan of austerity, the building of a new stadium that looks a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of a new striker?

A New Soccer Order: Executives Above Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels football. For decades, teams mistakenly delegated big footballing decisions to low-level employees such as coaches, scouts – players themselves. Perhaps it was once possible for an up-and-coming, visionary coach with a philosophy and energy to join an organization and implement their plan supported to fruition. But how many companies have these guys established? What number of mass redundancies have they managed? Far preferable to place genuine authority where it rightly belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the guys with impressive professional resumes. Better by far to determine the strategy in the boardroom and appoint a coach who can tailor their offering accordingly. If managers were once chefs, they have become more akin to Deliveroo drivers: not really responsible for the food, but still finally accountable if it arrives poorly or fails of the box.

Nowadays, a coach's role has become not about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing it: the receptionist of the operation, 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 two medium-sized trophies, and effectively gets sacked for talking. Wilfried Nancy finds his standing damaged while those individuals who appointed him live to blunder another day.

A Neoliberal Game: Accountability for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this is simply neoliberalism at work: the elevation of a privileged elite who can never be wrong, whose choices are always sacrosanct, whose mistakes can invariably be sacked away without explanation. Appoint the system coach and then fire them for playing too much 3-4-3. Bring in the project manager and then bin him for taking too long. And most importantly be grateful; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for your new player acquisitions, for the reality that the adults – however well qualified – remain in control.