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Turns out Ruben Amorim could survive defeat by lower-league opposition. He weathered an important European final against a particularly poor Tottenham teams for many years. He withstood losing at home against West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, an unwavering system, laying waste to some of the club’s most promising academy products, the 32% win rate, labeling his team the worst in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed a single opponent with whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to tango. If you challenge Jason Wilcox, you had better succeed.

Regrettably, similar to numerous top-flight right-back in Blackburn’s title-winning 1994-95 season, the coach came at Jason Wilcox and appears to have missed. The most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a manager who frequently berated his squad for failing in individual battles succumbing when confronted by the white heat and formidable presence of a England's top division's most intimidating football executives.

And frankly, this entire painful saga seems to paint the director in a whole new light. It may have been easy, given his nine months of experience at Southampton, to regard Jason Wilcox as merely a functionary within the club's structure: an individual whose appointment was due largely to his friendship with his former boss a fellow executive as any verifiable talent. How mistaken everyone was. By masterfully outmanoeuvring United’s feted head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless a previous executive before him, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated as one of the sport’s true generals: a tactical intellect that the club's competitors are now justifiably concerned.

The Strategic Conflict Over System and Philosophy

For example, it was Jason Wilcox who having been part of the leadership that hired the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim originally, played a key role in attempting to convince him to abandon his favored formation. Unsurprisingly, these pleas faced pushback. However, such directives carry more weight when issued by a man with the unimpeachable football pedigree he possesses, holder of three England caps and a role in a championship team from 31 years ago.

Maybe eventually he might agree to explain his thought processes to the rest of us. Perhaps at some point he might be asked why Amorim is walking away with full compensation, with no compensation reduction clause in place. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely publicly, and with very good reason. The true intellectuals in football – men like him – simply operate on a plane beyond our own prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, probably all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Desiring an explanation is not quite the same as being ready to receive.

An Ultimate Power In the Throne

Naturally, in training our focus on the sporting director we overlook the true genius behind the modern United throne. The director is, after all, simply carrying out the commands of his ultimate superior the billionaire owner, who in private has made very clear his preference for a four-man defense. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also suggested deploying the forward as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for the club to adopt analytics and analytics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his investment, he declared that United’s style of play “shall be decided in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is an expert in this technical footballing stuff, drawing from his background in petrochemicals and yachting. Above all he remains immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the rich are superior: more insightful, more wise, strategically brilliant, fundamentally superior. Who else could one trust to oversee a strategic plan of austerity, the building of a modern arena that appears a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of a new striker?

The New Football Order: Executives Above Managers

This is a trend that is becoming prevalent at the elite levels football. Historically, teams mistakenly entrusted major sporting choices to subordinate staff such as coaches, talent spotters – even footballers. Perhaps it was once possible for an up-and-coming, visionary coach with ideas and energy to join a club and implement their plan supported to fruition. Yet how many companies have such individuals established? What number of mass redundancies have they overseen? Far preferable to invest the real power where it belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with the jaw-dropping LinkedIn profiles. It is wiser to determine the tactics in the boardroom and appoint someone who will adapt their methods accordingly. If coaches were formerly chefs, they have become more akin to Deliveroo drivers: not really creating the product, yet ultimately answerable if it arrives cold or leaks out of the box.

Nowadays, a coach's role has become not about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the front-facing representative on the front desk, the visible figurehead of an organisation they have minimal power to change. A coach at Chelsea takes a squad of literal children into the Champions League and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively gets sacked for talking. Wilfried Nancy finds his standing damaged while those individuals who hired him continue to make errors indefinitely.

A Modern Corporate Game: Accountability Only for the Coaches

And perhaps on some microcosmic level this is simply neoliberalism in action: the elevation of a gilded overclass who can never be wrong, whose choices are always sacrosanct, whose mistakes can invariably be resolved by sacking without explanation. Hire the 3-4-3 coach only to dismiss him for using too much 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 your new summer signings, for the reality that the adults – however well qualified – remain in control.