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Tbecame clear Ruben Amorim endured losing against Grimsby. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece versus one of the worst Spurs sides in living memory. He withstood home defeats against West Ham and Wolves, finishing 15th, his rigid approach, undermining some of the club’s most promising academy products, a poor winning percentage, calling his team the poorest the club has ever seen. But there was one adversary against whom the Portuguese coach was not permitted to tango. You come at Jason Wilcox, you had better succeed.

Regrettably, similar to numerous top-flight defender during Blackburn Rovers' championship campaign, Amorim came at Jason Wilcox and seems to have failed. Even the most distracted of readers can see the irony here: a coach who often railed his squad for losing one-on-one duels crumbling when confronted by the intense pressure and formidable presence of one of the Premier League’s most intimidating football executives.

And frankly, this entire painful saga appears to portray Jason Wilcox in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been tempting, given his brief stint in a similar role at Southampton, to regard Jason Wilcox as little more than a drudge in the United exoskeleton: an individual whose appointment was due largely to his close relationship with his former boss a fellow executive as any verifiable talent. How wrong we all were. By masterfully outsmarting United’s feted head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless a previous executive before him, he has proved himself to be among football's strategic masterminds: a strategic mind of which the club's competitors are now rightly wary.

A Strategic Conflict Regarding System and Philosophy

To illustrate, it was the director who being involved in the hierarchy that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach in the first place, was instrumental in attempting to convince Amorim to abandon his favored formation. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties met a certain resistance. But perhaps such directives carry more weight when issued by a man of a man the impeccable soccer background of Jason Wilcox, holder of international appearances and a role in a title-winning side decades past.

Maybe eventually he might agree to explain his reasoning to the rest of us. Maybe one day questions may arise why Amorim is walking away with full compensation, without any compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks publicly, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers of this sport – individuals such as him – simply operate on a plane exceeding our mundane comprehension. Were he to speak, most likely all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Wanting is not quite the same as being prepared to receive.

An Ultimate Authority Behind Command

But of course, by focusing our attention on Jason Wilcox we overlook the true genius behind the club's current leadership. The director is, after all, simply carrying out the directives of his line manager the billionaire owner, who in private has emphasized his preference for a four-man defense. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also proposed deploying the forward as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for United to adopt analytics and analytics. Per reports, during a leadership summit soon after his minority ownership, he declared that the team's approach of play “shall be determined in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is an expert in this technical football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and sailing. Most importantly he remains immensely wealthy, and it is known, the wealthy are the best of us: more insightful, more wise, more tactically astute, simply better. Whom else would you trust to manage a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the building of a new stadium that looks a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of a new striker?

A New Soccer Hierarchy: Directors Over Managers

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels football. For decades, teams mistakenly delegated major sporting choices to low-level employees like managers, scouts – players themselves. Perhaps it was once possible for an up-and-coming, visionary coach with ideas and energy to go into an organization and implement their plan supported to fruition. But how many companies have these guys set up? How many large-scale layoffs have they overseen? Better by far to place the real power where it belongs: the leadership tier, the casually dressed executives, the guys with impressive LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to decide the tactics in the boardroom and appoint a coach who can tailor their offering accordingly. If coaches were formerly chefs, they are now more like delivery personnel: not really responsible for the product, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered poorly or leaks out of the box.

Nowadays, their job is increasingly less about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative on the front desk, the public face for a club they can do little to influence. Enzo Maresca takes a squad of very young players into the Champions League and wins domestic cups, and essentially gets sacked for speaking out. A manager at Celtic finds his reputation ruined while those individuals who hired him continue to make errors another day.

The Neoliberal Game: Responsibility for the Few

And perhaps on some microcosmic level this represents neoliberalism in action: the rise of a gilded overclass who can never be wrong, whose choices remain untouchable, whose mistakes can always be sacked away without justification. Appoint the system coach only to dismiss him for playing excessively 3-4-3. Hire the process guy and then bin him for requiring excessive time. And most importantly show gratitude; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the reality that the adults – however well qualified – remain in control.