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Transpired he could survive defeat by lower-league opposition. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece against a particularly poor Spurs sides for many years. He withstood losing at home against domestic rivals, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, squandering some of the club’s best homegrown talent, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. But there was one adversary with whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to engage. You come at Jason Wilcox, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight right-back in Blackburn’s title-winning campaign, Amorim took on Jason Wilcox and seems to have failed. Even the most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a manager who often railed his squad for failing in individual battles succumbing when confronted by the intense pressure and formidable presence of one of the Premier League’s most feared football executives.

In truth, this whole bruising episode seems to paint the director in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been easy, based on his brief stint in a similar role with the Saints, to regard him as little more than a functionary in the United exoskeleton: an individual who owed his position as much to his friendship with his former boss a fellow executive as any demonstrable skill. How wrong everyone was. By masterfully outmanoeuvring United’s feted manager, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth before him, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated to be among the sport’s true generals: a tactical intellect of which the club's competitors are now justifiably concerned.

A Strategic Clash Over Formation and Ideology

For example, it was Jason Wilcox , after being involved in the leadership that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim in the first place, played a key role in attempting to convince him to ditch his favored 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these pleas met a certain resistance. But perhaps such directives hold greater authority when delivered by a man with the unimpeachable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of three England caps and a role in a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time he may be persuaded to explain his reasoning to the rest of us. Maybe one day he might be asked regarding why the coach is departing with a full payout, without any penalty clause activated. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks publicly, and with very good reason. The real thinkers in football – individuals such as Jason Wilcox – simply operate on a plane beyond our own prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, most likely all we would hear is a series of ultrasonic blips and complex calculations. Wanting is not the same as being prepared to comprehend it.

The Supreme Authority Behind the Throne

But of course, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the real power behind the club's current leadership. The director is, after all, merely executing the directives of his superior Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has made very clear his desire for a four-man defense. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also suggested deploying the forward as a right wing-back. Ratcliffe is keen for the club to adopt data science and metrics. Per reports, during a leadership summit early in his investment, he declared that the team's approach of play “will be determined in this room”.

After all, Ratcliffe is a specialist in these intricate football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and sailing. Most importantly he remains immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the rich are the best of us: more insightful, more wise, strategically brilliant, simply better. Whom else would you trust to oversee a strategic plan of austerity, the construction of a modern arena that looks a lot like an abstract design, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

The Modern Soccer Hierarchy: Executives Above Coaches

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing in top-tier football. Historically, teams mistakenly delegated big footballing decisions to subordinate staff such as coaches, talent spotters – players themselves. Maybe previously feasible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and drive to go into a club and see their vision through to completion. Yet how many businesses have such individuals established? What number of mass redundancies have they managed? Far preferable to invest the real power where it belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with impressive professional resumes. It is wiser to decide the tactics in the boardroom and hire a coach who will adapt their methods to suit. If managers were formerly chefs, they have become more akin to delivery personnel: not responsible for the product, yet finally accountable if it arrives cold or leaks out of the box.

Nowadays, their job has become not about defining the vision and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative on the front desk, the visible figurehead of an organisation they have minimal power to influence. A coach at Chelsea leads a team of literal children into Europe and wins domestic cups, and effectively gets sacked for talking. Wilfried Nancy finds his standing damaged while those individuals who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Modern Corporate Football: Accountability for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this represents neoliberalism in action: the elevation of a gilded elite who are infallible, whose choices are always untouchable, whose errors can invariably be resolved by sacking without explanation. Hire the system coach and then dismiss them for using too much that system. Hire the project manager and later discard him for taking excessive time. And most importantly show gratitude; 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.