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Itranspired the manager was able to withstand defeat by lower-league opposition. Survive an important European final against one of the worst Tottenham teams in living memory. He withstood losing at home against domestic rivals, a lowly league position, the tactical inflexibility, squandering some of the club’s most promising homegrown talent, 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 tango. If you challenge Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, like many a Premiership right-back in Blackburn’s championship 1994-95 season, Amorim took on Jason Wilcox and seems to have missed. Even the most distracted of readers will notice the irony here: a coach who frequently berated at his players for failing in individual battles crumbling in the face of the intense pressure and animal charisma of one of the Premier League’s most intimidating football executives.

And frankly, this whole painful saga seems to paint the director in a different perspective. It may have been easy, given his brief stint in a similar role with the Saints, to regard Jason Wilcox as merely a functionary in the United exoskeleton: an individual who owed his position largely to his friendship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any verifiable talent. How wrong everyone was. In brilliantly outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth before him, Jason Wilcox has proved himself as one of football's strategic masterminds: a strategic mind of which the club's mid-table rivals are now justifiably concerned.

The Tactical Clash Over Formation & Philosophy

To illustrate, it was Jason Wilcox who being involved in the leadership that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach in the first place, played a key role in attempting to convince him to abandon his beloved 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties were resisted. However, these judgements carry more weight when delivered from the mouth of a man the impeccable soccer background of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of three England caps and a role in a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time Jason Wilcox may be persuaded to explain his reasoning to the rest of us. Perhaps at some point questions may arise why Amorim is walking away with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause in place. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks in public, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers of this sport – individuals such as him – function at a level exceeding our prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, probably we would perceive is a series of ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Desiring an explanation is not the same as being prepared to comprehend it.

The Supreme Power In Command

But of course, in training our focus on the sporting director we overlook the true genius behind the club's current leadership. The director is, in reality, merely executing the commands of his line manager the billionaire owner, 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 adopt data science and analytics. According to ESPN, during a leadership summit soon after his minority ownership, he declared that the team's approach to football “will be determined in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is a specialist in this technical football matters, leveraging his previous experience in petrochemicals and yachting. Most importantly he is immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the wealthy are the best of us: more perceptive, more wise, more tactically astute, fundamentally superior. Who else would you trust to manage an enlightened programme of austerity, the building of a modern arena that appears a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of a new striker?

The Modern Soccer Hierarchy: Directors Over Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing in top-tier of the game. Historically, clubs foolishly entrusted big footballing decisions to low-level employees like managers, scouts – even footballers. Maybe previously feasible for a young, innovative manager with a philosophy and drive to go into a club and implement their plan supported to fruition. Yet 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 rightly belongs: the executive class, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with the jaw-dropping professional resumes. Better by far to decide the tactics by the directors and hire someone who will adapt their offering accordingly. If managers were once chefs, they are now more like delivery personnel: not responsible for the food, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered cold or leaks out to meet standards.

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 for a club they have minimal power to influence. A coach at Chelsea leads a team of literal children into the Champions League and wins domestic cups, and essentially is dismissed for speaking out. A manager at Celtic sees his standing damaged whereas those individuals who appointed him continue to make errors another day.

The Modern Corporate Game: Responsibility Only for the Coaches

And possibly in a small way this is simply neoliberalism in action: the rise of a gilded overclass who can never be wrong, whose decisions remain untouchable, whose errors can invariably be sacked away without justification. Hire the system coach and then fire them for using too much 3-4-3. Hire the process guy and later discard him for requiring excessive time. And most importantly be grateful; for the incremental season ticket price rises, for your new player acquisitions, for the fact that the adults – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.