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Transpired Ruben Amorim could survive a loss to Grimsby. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece against one of the worst Spurs sides for many years. He could survive home defeats against domestic rivals, a lowly league position, an unwavering system, laying waste to the team's most promising academy products, a poor winning percentage, calling his team the poorest in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed a single opponent with whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to dance. You come at Jason Wilcox, you had better succeed.

Regrettably, like many a top-flight right-back in Blackburn’s championship campaign, Amorim came at Jason Wilcox and appears to have missed. The most casual observer can see the paradoxical situation: a manager who frequently berated his squad for losing individual battles succumbing in the face of the white heat and animal charisma of a England's top division's most feared sporting directors.

And frankly, this entire bruising episode appears to portray Jason Wilcox in a different perspective. Perhaps it might have been easy, based on his brief stint 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 Omar Berrada rather than any verifiable talent. How mistaken we all were. By masterfully outsmarting the club's celebrated manager, just as he bested the hapless Dan Ashworth earlier, he has demonstrated to be among football's true generals: a tactical intellect of which United’s mid-table rivals will now be rightly wary.

The Strategic Clash Regarding Formation & Ideology

For example, it was the director who having been part of the hierarchy that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach originally, played a key role in attempting to convince him to abandon his favored 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties met a certain resistance. However, these judgements hold greater authority when issued by a man of a man the unimpeachable soccer background he possesses, holder of international appearances and a role in a title-winning side from 31 years ago.

Perhaps in time Jason Wilcox might agree to explain his reasoning to the rest of us. Perhaps at some point questions may arise regarding why the coach is departing with full compensation, with no compensation reduction clause activated. The director speaks rarely in public, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers of this sport – men like Jason Wilcox – function on a plane exceeding our prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, probably we would perceive is a series of ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not quite the same as being prepared to comprehend it.

An Supreme Power Behind Command

But of course, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the true genius behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, after all, simply carrying out the directives of his superior Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who privately has emphasized his desire for a back four. According to reports, the owner has also suggested playing Bryan Mbeumo as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for United to adopt data science and analytics. Per reports, in an executive meeting soon after his investment, he declared that United’s style to football “shall be determined in this room”.

After all, Ratcliffe is a specialist in these intricate football matters, drawing from his previous experience in industry and yachting. Most importantly he is immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the wealthy are superior: more insightful, sagacious, more tactically astute, simply superior. Who else could one trust to manage a strategic plan of austerity, the building of a modern arena that looks similar to someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A Modern Soccer Hierarchy: Executives Above Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing in top-tier of the game. For decades, teams mistakenly entrusted major sporting choices to low-level employees like managers, scouts – players themselves. Maybe previously possible for a young, innovative manager with a philosophy and drive to go into a club and implement their plan through to completion. Yet how many companies have such individuals set up? What number of mass redundancies have they managed? Better by far to invest the real power where it belongs: the executive class, the casually dressed executives, the individuals with impressive LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to determine the strategy in the boardroom and hire someone who will adapt their offering to suit. If coaches were formerly chefs, they have become more akin to Deliveroo drivers: not creating the food, but still ultimately answerable if it arrives poorly or fails of the box.

In the meantime, a coach's role has become not about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the receptionist on the front desk, the visible figurehead of an organisation they have minimal power to change. A coach at Chelsea takes a squad of very young players into Europe and secures domestic cups, and essentially gets sacked for talking. Wilfried Nancy sees his reputation ruined whereas the people who hired him continue to make errors indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Football: Responsibility for the Few

And possibly on some microcosmic level this is simply neoliberalism in action: the rise of a gilded elite who can never be wrong, whose decisions are always sacrosanct, whose errors can always be sacked away without justification. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach only to dismiss them for playing excessively that system. Hire the project manager and then bin them for taking excessive time. And above all show gratitude; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the reality that the adults – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.