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Transpired Ruben Amorim was able to withstand a loss to Grimsby. Survive losing a crucial continental showpiece against a particularly poor Tottenham teams in living memory. He withstood losing at home against West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, the tactical inflexibility, squandering some of the club’s most promising academy products, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the worst in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed 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 1994-95 season, the coach took on Jason Wilcox and seems to have failed. The most distracted of readers will notice the irony here: a manager who often railed at his players for losing individual battles succumbing when confronted by the white heat and animal charisma of a the Premier League’s most intimidating football executives.

And frankly, this entire painful saga appears to portray the director in a different perspective. Perhaps it might have been tempting, given his nine months of experience with the Saints, to regard Jason Wilcox as little more than a functionary within the club's structure: a man whose appointment was due as much to his close relationship with ex-colleague Omar Berrada as any verifiable talent. How wrong we all were. By masterfully outmanoeuvring United’s feted manager, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth before him, Jason Wilcox has proved himself to be among football's true generals: a tactical intellect of which the club's mid-table rivals will now be rightly wary.

A Strategic Clash Regarding Formation & Philosophy

To illustrate, this was Jason Wilcox who being involved in the hierarchy that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim in the first place, played a key role in attempting to convince Amorim to ditch his favored 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties met a certain resistance. However, these judgements hold greater authority when issued by a man with the unimpeachable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of international appearances and a contributor to a title-winning side decades past.

Maybe eventually Jason Wilcox might agree to outline his thought processes publicly. Maybe one day he might be asked why Amorim is departing with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause in place. The director speaks rarely publicly, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers of this sport – individuals such as him – function at a level exceeding our prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, most likely all we would hear is a series of ultrasonic blips and complex calculations. Desiring an explanation is not quite equivalent to being ready to comprehend it.

An Ultimate Power In Command

But of course, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we overlook the real power behind the modern United throne. The director is, in reality, merely executing the commands of his ultimate superior the billionaire owner, who privately has emphasized his preference for a back four. It is reported, the owner has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for United to adopt data science and analytics. Per reports, during a leadership summit early in his minority ownership, he announced that the team's approach of play “will be decided in this room”.

Ultimately, Sir Jim is an expert in this technical footballing stuff, leveraging his previous experience in industry and yachting. Above all he is incredibly rich, and as we all know, the rich are the best of us: more perceptive, sagacious, more tactically astute, fundamentally superior. Who else would you trust to oversee a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the building of a new stadium that appears a lot like an abstract design, the signing of Benjamin Sesko?

A New Soccer Hierarchy: Directors Over Managers

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing in top-tier football. For decades, teams mistakenly delegated big footballing decisions to subordinate staff like managers, talent spotters – even footballers. Maybe previously possible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and drive to go into an organization and see their vision through to completion. But how many companies have these guys set up? How many mass redundancies have they overseen? Far preferable to place genuine authority where it belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with the jaw-dropping professional resumes. It is wiser to decide the strategy in the boardroom and appoint a coach who can tailor their offering to suit. If managers were formerly chefs, they are now more akin to delivery personnel: not responsible for the product, yet ultimately answerable if it arrives poorly or fails to meet standards.

In the meantime, a coach's role has become less about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the receptionist on the front desk, the public face 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 two medium-sized trophies, and effectively is dismissed for speaking out. Wilfried Nancy sees his standing damaged while the people who hired him live to blunder another day.

A Neoliberal Football: Accountability for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this represents corporate governance at work: the elevation of a gilded overclass who can never be wrong, whose decisions are always sacrosanct, whose errors can always be resolved by sacking without explanation. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach and then fire them for playing too much that system. Hire the project manager and later discard him for requiring excessive time. And most importantly show gratitude; for your modest increases in ticket costs, for your new summer signings, for the reality that the grownups – regardless of their expertise – remain in control.