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Tbecame clear the manager could survive losing against lower-league opposition. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece versus a particularly poor Spurs sides in living memory. He could survive home defeats against domestic rivals, finishing 15th, the tactical inflexibility, laying waste to the team's most promising academy products, the 32% win rate, labeling the squad the worst the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed a single opponent with whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to dance. If you challenge the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight defender during Blackburn Rovers' title-winning campaign, Amorim came at Jason Wilcox and seems to have failed. Even the most casual observer will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who frequently berated at his players for failing in individual battles succumbing when confronted by the intense pressure and animal charisma of one of the Premier League’s most intimidating football executives.

In truth, this whole bruising episode seems to paint the director in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been easy, based on his nine months in a similar role with the Saints, to regard Jason Wilcox as merely a drudge within the club's structure: a man whose appointment was due largely to his friendship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any verifiable talent. How mistaken everyone was. By masterfully outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated manager, just as he bested the unfortunate a previous executive earlier, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated to be among football's true generals: a tactical intellect of which the club's mid-table rivals are now rightly wary.

A Strategic Conflict Regarding Formation & Ideology

For example, it was Jason Wilcox who being involved in the hierarchy that hired the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim originally, played a key role in attempting to convince him to abandon his favored 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these pleas faced pushback. However, such directives carry more weight when issued by a man of a man the unimpeachable football pedigree he possesses, a veteran of international appearances and a contributor to a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time he might agree to explain his reasoning to the rest of us. Perhaps at some point questions may arise regarding why the coach is walking away with full compensation, with no compensation reduction clause in place. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks in public, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers of this sport – men like Jason Wilcox – simply operate at a level exceeding our mundane comprehension. If he ever did speak, most likely we would perceive would be high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not quite equivalent to being ready to receive.

The Supreme Authority Behind 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 directives of his line manager the billionaire owner, who in private has emphasized his preference for a four-man defense. According to reports, the owner has also suggested deploying the forward as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for United to embrace analytics and analytics. Per reports, in an executive meeting early in his investment, he announced that United’s style of play “shall be decided in this room”.

Ultimately, Ratcliffe is a specialist in this technical football matters, drawing from his previous experience in petrochemicals and yachting. Above all he is immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the rich are superior: more insightful, sagacious, strategically brilliant, fundamentally superior. Who else could one trust to oversee an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the construction of a modern arena that appears similar to someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A New Soccer Hierarchy: Directors Over Coaches

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing in top-tier of the game. For decades, clubs foolishly delegated big footballing decisions to low-level employees like managers, scouts – even footballers. Maybe previously possible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and drive to go into a club and see their vision supported to fruition. But how many companies have these guys set up? How many mass redundancies have they overseen? Better by far to place genuine authority where it belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with the jaw-dropping LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to decide the tactics in the boardroom and appoint a coach who can tailor their offering to suit. If coaches were formerly chefs, they have become more akin to delivery personnel: not creating the food, but still ultimately answerable should it be delivered cold or fails of the box.

In the meantime, their job is increasingly not about defining the vision and more about selling it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the visible figurehead of an organisation they can do little to change. Enzo Maresca leads a team of literal children into Europe and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively is dismissed for speaking out. A manager at Celtic finds his reputation ruined whereas the people who hired him continue to make errors indefinitely.

The Neoliberal Game: Accountability Only for the Coaches

And perhaps in a small way this represents neoliberalism in action: the rise of a gilded elite who can never be wrong, whose decisions are always untouchable, whose mistakes can invariably be resolved by sacking without justification. Appoint the system coach only to fire them for using too much 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and then discard them for taking excessive time. And above all show gratitude; for your modest increases in ticket costs, for your new player acquisitions, for the reality that the grownups – however well qualified – remain in control.