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Transpired the manager could survive defeat by lower-league opposition. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece against a particularly poor Tottenham teams in living memory. He withstood home defeats against West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, undermining some of the club’s most promising homegrown talent, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the worst in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed a single opponent with whom the Portuguese coach would not be allowed to dance. You come at Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight right-back during Blackburn Rovers' championship campaign, Amorim took on the executive and appears to have missed. Even the most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who frequently berated his squad for losing individual battles succumbing in the face of the intense pressure and animal charisma of one of England's top division's most feared sporting directors.

And frankly, this whole bruising episode appears to portray the director in a whole new light. It may have been tempting, given his brief stint in a similar role at Southampton, to regard him as little more than a functionary within the club's structure: an individual who owed his position largely to his friendship with ex-colleague a fellow executive rather than any demonstrable skill. How mistaken we all were. In brilliantly outmanoeuvring United’s feted head coach, just as he bested the unfortunate Dan Ashworth earlier, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated as one of football's strategic masterminds: a strategic mind that the club's competitors are now justifiably concerned.

A Tactical Clash Over Formation & Philosophy

For example, this was the director who being involved in the hierarchy that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim in the first place, was instrumental in trying to persuade him to ditch his beloved 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these pleas were resisted. However, these judgements carry more weight when delivered by a man with the unimpeachable soccer background of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of international appearances and a role in a championship team decades past.

Maybe eventually Jason Wilcox might agree to outline his thought processes to the rest of us. Maybe one day he might be asked regarding why the coach is walking away with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause in place. The director seldom speaks in public, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers in football – men like him – simply operate at a level exceeding our prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, probably all we would hear is a series of ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Desiring an explanation is not quite the same as being ready to comprehend it.

An Ultimate Power In Command

Naturally, by focusing our attention on the sporting director we overlook the true genius behind the modern United throne. Jason Wilcox is, after all, simply carrying out the commands of his line manager the billionaire owner, who in private has made very clear his desire for a back four. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for United to adopt data science and analytics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his investment, he declared that United’s style to football “will be determined in this room”.

After all, Ratcliffe is an expert in these intricate football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and sailing. Most importantly he remains incredibly rich, and as we all know, the wealthy are the best of us: more perceptive, more wise, strategically brilliant, fundamentally better. 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 a new striker?

The New Soccer Order: Executives Over Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels of the game. Historically, clubs foolishly entrusted major sporting choices to low-level employees such as coaches, talent spotters – even footballers. Maybe previously feasible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with a philosophy and energy to join an organization and implement their plan through to completion. But how many businesses have such individuals established? What number of large-scale layoffs have they managed? Better by far to place the real power where it belongs: the executive class, the open-necked shirt brigade, the guys with the jaw-dropping LinkedIn profiles. It is wiser to determine the tactics by the directors and hire a coach who will adapt their methods accordingly. If coaches were once chefs, they have become more akin to Deliveroo drivers: not really responsible for the product, but still ultimately answerable if it arrives cold or fails of the box.

In the meantime, their job has become not about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative 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 the Champions League and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic sees his standing damaged while those individuals who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

The Neoliberal Football: Accountability for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this is simply neoliberalism at work: the elevation of a privileged overclass who are infallible, whose decisions remain untouchable, whose errors can invariably be resolved by sacking without justification. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach and then fire them for using excessively 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and then bin them for requiring excessive time. And above all be grateful; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for your new player acquisitions, for the fact that the adults – regardless of their expertise – remain in control.