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Itbecame clear the manager could survive losing against lower-league opposition. Survive a decisive European final against a particularly poor Spurs sides in living memory. He withstood losing at home to domestic rivals, finishing 15th, his rigid approach, laying waste to some of the club’s best academy products, a poor winning percentage, calling his team the worst the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed a single opponent against whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to tango. You come at the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight right-back during Blackburn Rovers' championship campaign, Amorim came at the executive and seems to have missed. Even the most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a manager who frequently berated at his players for losing individual battles crumbling in the face of the white heat and formidable presence of one of England's top division's most intimidating sporting directors.

And frankly, this entire bruising episode seems to paint Jason Wilcox in a different perspective. It may have been easy, based on his nine months in a similar role with the Saints, to regard him as merely a functionary within the club's structure: an individual whose appointment was due as much to his friendship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any demonstrable skill. How wrong everyone was. In brilliantly outmanoeuvring United’s feted head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth earlier, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated as one of the sport’s strategic masterminds: a strategic mind of which United’s competitors are now justifiably concerned.

The Strategic Clash Over System and Philosophy

For example, this was Jason Wilcox who having been part of the hierarchy that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach originally, was instrumental in attempting to convince Amorim to abandon his beloved formation. Unsurprisingly, these pleas met a certain resistance. But perhaps these judgements hold greater authority when delivered from the mouth with the impeccable soccer background of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of three England caps and a role in a title-winning side from 31 years ago.

Maybe eventually Jason Wilcox might agree to explain his reasoning to the rest of us. Maybe one day he might be asked regarding why the coach is walking away with full compensation, without any penalty clause activated. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely publicly, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers in football – men like Jason Wilcox – simply operate on a plane beyond our own mundane comprehension. Were he to speak, most likely all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Desiring an explanation is not the same as being ready to receive.

An Ultimate Authority In the Throne

But of course, in training our focus on the sporting director we overlook the true genius behind the modern United throne. Jason Wilcox is, after all, merely executing the directives of his line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has made very clear his desire for a four-man defense. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also suggested deploying the forward in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for United to embrace analytics and metrics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his minority ownership, he declared that the team's approach to football “shall be determined in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is an expert in this technical footballing stuff, leveraging his background in industry and sailing. Above all he remains incredibly rich, and as we all know, the rich are superior: more perceptive, more wise, more tactically astute, fundamentally superior. Who else could one trust to oversee an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the construction of a new stadium that appears similar to an abstract design, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A New Football Hierarchy: Directors Above Coaches

This is a trend that is becoming prevalent at the elite levels of the game. Historically, clubs foolishly delegated big footballing decisions to subordinate staff like managers, scouts – even footballers. Maybe previously possible for a young, innovative manager with ideas and drive to join an organization and see their vision through to completion. But how many businesses have such individuals set up? How many large-scale layoffs have they managed? Better by far to invest the real power where it belongs: the executive class, the open-necked shirt brigade, the guys with impressive LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to determine the strategy in the boardroom and appoint a coach who will adapt their methods to suit. If managers were formerly chefs, they have become more like Deliveroo drivers: not creating the food, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered poorly or leaks out of the box.

In the meantime, a coach's role is increasingly less about defining the vision and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the visible figurehead of an organisation they have minimal power to influence. A coach at Chelsea takes a squad of literal children into the Champions League and secures domestic cups, and essentially is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic sees his reputation ruined whereas those individuals who hired him live to blunder another day.

The Modern Corporate Football: Accountability Only for the Coaches

And possibly in a small way this represents neoliberalism in action: the rise of a gilded elite who can never be wrong, whose choices are always sacrosanct, whose mistakes can invariably be resolved by sacking without justification. Appoint the system coach only to dismiss them for playing excessively 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and later discard them for requiring too long. And most importantly be grateful; for your modest season ticket price rises, for your new summer signings, for the reality that the adults – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.