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Tbecame clear Ruben Amorim endured losing against lower-league opposition. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece versus one of the worst Spurs sides in living memory. He could survive losing at home against domestic rivals, finishing 15th, his rigid approach, laying waste to some of the club’s best academy products, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. But there was a single opponent against whom the Portuguese coach was not permitted to tango. You come at Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight right-back in Blackburn’s championship campaign, Amorim took on Jason Wilcox and appears to have failed. The most casual observer will notice the paradoxical situation: a manager who frequently berated his squad for failing in individual battles succumbing when confronted by the intense pressure and formidable presence of one of the Premier League’s most intimidating sporting directors.

In truth, this entire painful saga seems to paint the director in a different perspective. It may have been tempting, based on his brief stint of experience at Southampton, to regard Jason Wilcox as merely a drudge in the United exoskeleton: a man who owed his position largely to his close relationship with ex-colleague Omar Berrada as any verifiable talent. How wrong everyone was. In brilliantly outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated head coach, just as he bested the unfortunate Dan Ashworth before him, he has demonstrated to be among the sport’s strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect that United’s competitors are now rightly wary.

A Strategic Conflict Over Formation and Ideology

To illustrate, this was Jason Wilcox who being involved in the leadership that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist the coach in the first place, played a key role in attempting to convince Amorim to abandon his beloved formation. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties were resisted. However, such directives hold greater authority when delivered from the mouth with the impeccable football pedigree he possesses, holder of international appearances and a role in a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time he may be persuaded to explain his reasoning publicly. Perhaps at some point questions may arise why Amorim is walking away with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause in place. The director speaks rarely publicly, and with very good reason. The true intellectuals of this sport – men like Jason Wilcox – simply operate at a level exceeding our prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, probably all we would hear would be ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not quite the same as being ready to receive.

The Ultimate Power In the Throne

But of course, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we overlook the true genius behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, after all, merely executing the commands of his line manager the billionaire owner, who privately has emphasized his preference for a back four. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also proposed deploying the forward in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for United to embrace analytics and metrics. According to ESPN, during a leadership summit soon after his investment, he declared that United’s style to football “shall be decided by this group”.

After all, Ratcliffe is a specialist in this technical football matters, leveraging his background in petrochemicals and sailing. Above all he remains immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the rich are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, more tactically astute, simply superior. Who else could one trust to oversee a strategic plan of austerity, the construction of a modern arena that looks a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A Modern Football Hierarchy: Executives Above Coaches

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing in top-tier football. For decades, clubs foolishly entrusted major sporting choices to subordinate staff such as coaches, scouts – players themselves. Maybe previously possible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and energy to go into a club and see their vision supported to fruition. But how many businesses have such individuals set up? What number of large-scale layoffs have they overseen? Far preferable to place the real power where it belongs: the executive class, the casually dressed executives, the guys with the jaw-dropping LinkedIn profiles. It is wiser to determine the tactics by the directors and appoint a coach who will adapt their methods accordingly. If coaches were once chefs, they are now more like Deliveroo drivers: not really responsible for the product, but still finally accountable if it arrives cold or leaks out to meet standards.

In the meantime, a coach's role is increasingly not about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the front-facing representative on the front desk, the public face for a club they have minimal power to influence. Enzo Maresca takes a squad of very young players into the Champions League and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively gets sacked for speaking out. A manager at Celtic finds his reputation ruined while the people who appointed him continue to make errors indefinitely.

The Modern Corporate Game: Responsibility 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 mistakes can invariably be sacked away without explanation. Hire the 3-4-3 coach and then dismiss them for playing excessively that system. Bring in the process guy and later bin him for requiring excessive time. And most importantly be grateful; for the incremental season ticket price rises, for your new player acquisitions, for the fact that the grownups – regardless of their expertise – remain in control.