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Tbecame clear he endured a loss to Grimsby. He weathered an important continental showpiece against a particularly poor Tottenham teams in living memory. He could survive losing at home to domestic rivals, a lowly league position, the tactical inflexibility, squandering some of the club’s best academy products, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. But there was one adversary against whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to tango. If you challenge the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, similar to numerous top-flight right-back during Blackburn Rovers' title-winning 1994-95 season, the coach came at Jason Wilcox and appears to have missed. The most casual observer can see the paradoxical situation: a manager 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.

And frankly, this whole painful saga appears to portray Jason Wilcox in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been easy, given his brief stint of experience with the Saints, to view him as merely a drudge within the club's structure: a man whose appointment was due as much to his friendship with ex-colleague Omar Berrada as any demonstrable skill. How wrong we all were. By masterfully outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated manager, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth before him, Jason Wilcox has proved himself to be among the sport’s strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect of which the club's mid-table rivals will now be rightly wary.

A Tactical Conflict Over System and Ideology

To illustrate, it was the director , after being involved in the leadership that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim originally, was instrumental in trying to persuade Amorim to abandon his beloved formation. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties were resisted. But perhaps these judgements hold greater authority when issued by a man with the unimpeachable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, holder of international appearances 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. Perhaps at some point he might be asked why Amorim is walking away with a full payout, with no penalty clause in place. The director speaks rarely in public, and with very good reason. The true intellectuals of this sport – individuals such as him – simply operate at a level beyond our own prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, probably all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Desiring an explanation is not equivalent to being prepared to receive.

An Supreme Authority In the Throne

Naturally, by focusing our attention on the sporting director we overlook the real power behind the modern United throne. Jason Wilcox is, in reality, merely executing the directives of his superior the billionaire owner, who privately has made very clear his desire for a four-man defense. It is reported, the owner has also suggested playing Bryan Mbeumo in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for the club to embrace data science and analytics. According to ESPN, during a leadership summit soon after his minority ownership, he declared that United’s style of play “shall be decided in this room”.

After all, Ratcliffe is an expert in these intricate football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and yachting. Most importantly he is incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are the best of us: more insightful, sagacious, strategically brilliant, fundamentally better. Who else could one trust to oversee a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the building of a new stadium that appears a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A Modern Football Order: Executives Over Managers

This is a trend that is becoming prevalent at the elite levels football. Historically, teams mistakenly entrusted big footballing decisions to low-level employees like managers, talent spotters – even footballers. Maybe previously possible 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 businesses have such individuals set up? What number of mass redundancies have they overseen? Better by far to place the real power where it belongs: the executive class, the open-necked shirt brigade, the guys with impressive professional resumes. It is wiser to decide the strategy by the directors and appoint someone who will adapt their offering accordingly. If coaches were formerly chefs, they are now more like Deliveroo drivers: not creating the food, yet finally accountable if it arrives poorly or fails of the box.

In the meantime, a coach's role is increasingly less about defining the vision and more about selling it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the public face of an organisation they can do little to influence. Enzo Maresca leads a team of literal children into the Champions League and wins two medium-sized trophies, and effectively gets sacked for talking. Wilfried Nancy sees his reputation ruined whereas those individuals who hired him continue to make errors indefinitely.

The Neoliberal Football: Responsibility for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this is simply neoliberalism in action: the rise of a gilded elite who can never be wrong, whose choices remain sacrosanct, whose mistakes can invariably be resolved by sacking without justification. Appoint the system coach and then fire them for playing too much 3-4-3. Bring in the process guy and later discard them for requiring excessive time. And above all be grateful; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for your new player acquisitions, for the reality that the grownups – however well qualified – remain in control.