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Turns out Ruben Amorim endured losing against lower-league opposition. He weathered an important European final versus one of the worst Tottenham teams for many years. He could survive losing at home against domestic rivals, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, laying waste to some of the club’s best academy products, the 32% win rate, calling his team the poorest the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed a single opponent with whom the Portuguese coach was not permitted to engage. If you challenge the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, similar to numerous top-flight defender in Blackburn’s title-winning 1994-95 season, the coach took on the executive and appears to have failed. The most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who often railed his squad for failing in one-on-one duels crumbling in the face of the white heat and formidable presence of a England's top division's most feared sporting directors.

And frankly, this entire bruising episode seems to paint the director in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been tempting, based on his nine months of experience with the Saints, to regard him as little more than a drudge in the United exoskeleton: an individual who owed his position as much to his friendship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any verifiable talent. How mistaken everyone was. By masterfully outsmarting United’s feted head coach, just as he bested the unfortunate Dan Ashworth before him, Jason Wilcox 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.

A Tactical Conflict Regarding System and Philosophy

To illustrate, it was Jason Wilcox , after being involved in the hierarchy that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim originally, played a key role in trying to persuade Amorim to abandon his favored formation. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties met a certain resistance. However, such directives carry more weight when delivered by a man with the impeccable football pedigree he possesses, holder of international appearances and a contributor to a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time he might agree to outline his thought processes to the rest of us. Maybe one day he might be asked regarding why the coach is departing with a full payout, with no compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely publicly, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals in football – men like him – simply operate at a level exceeding our mundane comprehension. If he ever did speak, probably all we would hear is a series of high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Wanting is not the same as being prepared to receive.

An Ultimate Power In the Throne

But of course, by focusing our attention on the sporting director we overlook the real power behind the modern United throne. The director is, in reality, simply carrying out the commands of his line manager the billionaire owner, who privately has made very clear his preference for a back four. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo in a wing-back role. Ratcliffe is keen for United to embrace data science and analytics. Per reports, in an executive meeting early in his investment, he declared that United’s style of play “shall be decided in this room”.

After all, Ratcliffe is a specialist in these intricate football matters, drawing from his background in industry and yachting. Above all he is incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, strategically brilliant, fundamentally superior. Whom else could one trust to manage an enlightened programme of austerity, the construction of a new stadium that looks similar to someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of Benjamin Sesko?

A Modern Football Hierarchy: Directors Over Managers

This represents a shift that is becoming prevalent in top-tier football. For decades, clubs foolishly delegated major sporting choices to low-level employees like managers, talent spotters – even footballers. 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 through to completion. But how many businesses have these guys established? How many large-scale layoffs have they overseen? Better by far to invest the real power where it rightly belongs: the executive class, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with impressive professional resumes. It is wiser to determine the strategy by the directors and appoint a coach who will adapt their offering to suit. If managers were once chefs, they are now more like delivery personnel: not really responsible for the product, yet finally accountable if it arrives poorly or fails of the box.

In the meantime, their job is increasingly not about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing it: the receptionist on the front desk, the public face for a club they can do little to influence. A coach at Chelsea leads a team of very young players into Europe and wins domestic cups, and essentially is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic sees his reputation ruined while those individuals who hired him continue to make errors indefinitely.

The Modern Corporate Game: Accountability for the Coaches

And perhaps in a small way this is simply neoliberalism at work: the rise of a gilded overclass who are infallible, whose choices are always sacrosanct, whose errors can invariably be resolved by sacking without explanation. Hire the system coach and then dismiss them for playing excessively 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and later bin them for taking excessive time. And most importantly be grateful; for your modest increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the fact that the grownups – however well qualified – are in charge.