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Turns out Ruben Amorim could survive losing against Grimsby. He weathered an important European final versus a particularly poor Tottenham teams in living memory. He could survive home defeats to domestic rivals, finishing 15th, his rigid approach, undermining the team's most promising homegrown talent, a poor winning percentage, labeling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. But there was one adversary against whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to engage. You come at the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight right-back during Blackburn Rovers' championship 1994-95 season, Amorim came at the executive and appears to have failed. The most casual observer will notice the paradoxical situation: a manager who often railed his squad for failing in one-on-one duels succumbing 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 whole bruising episode 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 drudge in the United exoskeleton: an individual whose appointment was due as much to his close relationship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any verifiable talent. How wrong we all were. By masterfully outmanoeuvring United’s feted head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the unfortunate Dan Ashworth before him, Jason Wilcox has proved himself as one of the sport’s strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect that United’s competitors are now rightly wary.

The Strategic Clash Over System and Ideology

To illustrate, it was the director who being involved in the leadership that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach originally, played a key role in attempting to convince him to ditch his favored 3-4-3. Naturally, these entreaties met a certain resistance. However, such directives carry more weight when issued by a man with the impeccable soccer background he possesses, a veteran of three England caps and a contributor to a title-winning side decades past.

Perhaps in time Jason Wilcox may be persuaded to outline his thought processes to the rest of us. Maybe one day questions may arise why Amorim is departing with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks in public, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals in football – individuals such as Jason Wilcox – function at a level exceeding our mundane comprehension. Were he to speak, most likely all we would hear is a series of high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Wanting is not quite equivalent to being prepared to comprehend it.

An Ultimate Authority Behind Command

But of course, by focusing our attention on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the true genius behind the modern United throne. Jason Wilcox is, after all, merely executing the commands of his line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who privately has made very clear his preference for a back four. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also suggested deploying the forward in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for the club to adopt data science and analytics. Per reports, in an executive meeting soon after his minority ownership, he announced that United’s style to football “will be decided by this group”.

After all, Ratcliffe is an expert in this technical footballing stuff, drawing from his previous experience in industry and yachting. Most importantly he remains incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are superior: more perceptive, more wise, strategically brilliant, fundamentally better. Who else could one trust to oversee a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the construction of a new stadium that looks a lot like an abstract design, the acquisition of a new striker?

The New Soccer Hierarchy: Executives Over Coaches

This represents a shift that is becoming prevalent in top-tier football. Historically, clubs foolishly delegated big footballing decisions to low-level employees such as coaches, talent spotters – players themselves. Perhaps it was once feasible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and energy to join an organization and implement their plan through to completion. But how many businesses have these guys set up? How many mass redundancies have they overseen? Better by far to invest genuine authority where it rightly belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the guys with impressive LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to determine the tactics in the boardroom and hire someone who will adapt their methods accordingly. If managers were formerly chefs, they are now more like Deliveroo drivers: not responsible for the food, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered poorly or leaks out to meet standards.

In the meantime, their job is increasingly less about defining the vision and more about marketing it: the receptionist on the front desk, the visible figurehead for a club they have minimal power to influence. Enzo Maresca leads a team of literal children into Europe and wins domestic cups, and essentially gets sacked for talking. A manager at Celtic sees his reputation ruined whereas the people who hired him live to blunder another day.

A Modern Corporate Game: Accountability Only for the Coaches

And perhaps in a small way this represents corporate governance at work: the elevation of a gilded overclass who can never be wrong, whose choices are always untouchable, whose errors can invariably be sacked away without justification. Hire the 3-4-3 coach only to dismiss them for playing too much that system. Hire the process guy and later bin him for requiring excessive time. And most importantly be grateful; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for your new summer signings, for the fact that the adults – however well qualified – remain in control.