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Transpired the manager was able to withstand defeat by lower-league opposition. Survive an important European final against one of the worst Spurs sides in living memory. He withstood home defeats against domestic rivals, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, laying waste to some of the club’s best academy products, a poor winning percentage, labeling his team the worst the club has ever seen. But there was a single opponent against whom the Portuguese coach would not be allowed to engage. If you challenge the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, similar to numerous top-flight right-back during Blackburn Rovers' championship 1994-95 season, the coach came at the executive and appears to have failed. Even the most distracted of readers can see the paradoxical situation: a coach who often railed at his players for failing in individual battles succumbing when confronted by the intense pressure and animal charisma of one of England's top division's most intimidating sporting directors.

And frankly, this entire painful saga appears to portray Jason Wilcox in a different perspective. Perhaps it might have been tempting, based on his brief stint of experience at Southampton, to view Jason Wilcox as merely a drudge within the club's structure: a man whose appointment was due largely to his friendship with ex-colleague Omar Berrada rather than any demonstrable skill. How wrong everyone was. In brilliantly outmanoeuvring United’s feted manager, just as he bested the unfortunate Dan Ashworth earlier, he has demonstrated as one of football's true generals: a strategic mind that United’s competitors will now be justifiably concerned.

A Strategic Conflict Regarding System and Ideology

To illustrate, this was the director who being involved in the leadership that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim in the first place, played a key role in attempting to convince Amorim to ditch his favored 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties faced pushback. But perhaps such directives carry more weight when issued by a man with the impeccable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, holder of three England caps and a role in a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time he may be persuaded to explain his thought processes to the rest of us. Perhaps at some point questions may arise why Amorim is walking away with full compensation, with no compensation reduction clause activated. The director speaks rarely publicly, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals in football – individuals such as Jason Wilcox – simply operate at a level beyond our own prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, probably all we would hear would be ultrasonic blips and complex calculations. Desiring an explanation is not equivalent to being ready to receive.

The Supreme Power Behind Command

Naturally, in training our focus on the sporting director we are obscuring the true genius behind the modern United throne. The director is, in reality, simply carrying out the commands of his ultimate superior the billionaire owner, who in private has emphasized his preference for a back four. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also proposed deploying the forward in a wing-back role. Ratcliffe is keen for the club to adopt analytics and metrics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his minority ownership, he declared that the team's approach of play “will be decided by this group”.

Ultimately, Sir Jim is an expert in these intricate footballing stuff, leveraging his previous experience in industry and yachting. Most importantly he is incredibly rich, and as we all know, the wealthy are the best of us: more insightful, sagacious, strategically brilliant, simply superior. Whom else would you trust to manage a strategic plan of austerity, the construction of a new stadium that appears similar to someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of Benjamin Sesko?

The New Football Hierarchy: Directors Above Coaches

This represents a shift that is becoming prevalent in top-tier football. Historically, clubs foolishly delegated major sporting choices to low-level employees like managers, talent spotters – even footballers. Perhaps it was once possible for an up-and-coming, visionary coach with ideas and energy to go into an organization and see their vision supported to fruition. Yet how many businesses have such individuals set up? What number of large-scale layoffs have they overseen? Better by far to place the real power where it belongs: the leadership tier, the casually dressed executives, the individuals with impressive professional resumes. It is wiser to decide the tactics in the boardroom and hire a coach who can tailor their methods accordingly. If coaches were formerly chefs, they have become more like Deliveroo drivers: not really responsible for the food, yet ultimately answerable if it arrives cold or fails to meet standards.

In the meantime, their job is increasingly not about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative on the front desk, the public face of an organisation they have minimal power to change. A coach at Chelsea leads a team of very young players into Europe and wins domestic cups, and essentially gets sacked for talking. A manager at Celtic finds his standing damaged whereas those individuals who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

The Neoliberal Football: Responsibility for the Coaches

And possibly on some microcosmic level this is simply neoliberalism in action: the rise of a privileged elite who are infallible, whose choices remain untouchable, whose mistakes can invariably be sacked away without explanation. Hire the system coach only to fire them for playing too much 3-4-3. Bring in the project manager and later discard them for requiring too long. And above all be grateful; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for your new player acquisitions, for the fact that the grownups – however well qualified – remain in control.