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Turns out the manager was able to withstand a loss to Grimsby. Survive losing a crucial continental showpiece against one of the worst Spurs sides for many years. He could survive home defeats against West Ham and Wolves, finishing 15th, an unwavering system, undermining the team's most promising academy products, a poor winning percentage, calling his team the worst the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed a single opponent against whom the Portuguese coach was not permitted to engage. You come at the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Regrettably, similar to numerous top-flight right-back during Blackburn Rovers' title-winning campaign, the coach came at the executive and seems to have failed. Even the most casual observer will notice the paradoxical situation: a manager who often railed his squad for losing 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 whole painful saga seems to paint the director in a different perspective. Perhaps it might have been tempting, based on his nine months of experience at Southampton, to regard Jason Wilcox as little more than a functionary within the club's structure: a man whose appointment was due largely to his friendship with ex-colleague a fellow executive rather than any demonstrable skill. How wrong everyone was. By masterfully outsmarting the club's celebrated manager, just as he bested the hapless a previous executive before him, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated to be among football's strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect of which the club's mid-table rivals are now rightly wary.

A Strategic Conflict Regarding Formation and Ideology

For example, this was the director who having been part of the hierarchy that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim originally, played a key role in attempting to convince him to abandon his beloved 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties faced pushback. But perhaps these judgements hold greater authority when delivered by a man with the impeccable football pedigree he possesses, a veteran of three England caps and a contributor to a championship team decades past.

Maybe eventually he might agree to outline his thought processes to the rest of us. Perhaps at some point he might be asked why Amorim is departing with full compensation, with no penalty clause activated. The director speaks rarely in public, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers in football – individuals such as him – function at a level exceeding our mundane comprehension. Were he to speak, probably all we would hear is a series of high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not quite equivalent to being ready to comprehend it.

The Supreme Power Behind Command

Naturally, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the real power behind the modern United throne. The director is, in reality, merely executing the directives of his superior the billionaire owner, who privately has made very clear his preference for a back four. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also suggested deploying the forward as a right wing-back. The owner is eager for United to adopt analytics and metrics. Per reports, in an executive meeting soon after his minority ownership, he announced that United’s style of play “shall be decided by this group”.

After all, Ratcliffe is a specialist in this technical football matters, drawing from his background in industry and sailing. Above all he is incredibly rich, and it is known, the wealthy are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, strategically brilliant, fundamentally superior. Who else would you trust to oversee a strategic plan of austerity, the construction of a new stadium that looks a lot like an abstract design, the acquisition of a new striker?

The New Soccer Order: Executives Above Coaches

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels football. Historically, teams mistakenly delegated major sporting choices to low-level employees like managers, talent spotters – even footballers. Maybe previously possible for a young, visionary coach with ideas and drive to join an organization and see their vision through to completion. Yet how many companies have these guys set up? What number of large-scale layoffs have they managed? Better by far to place genuine authority where it rightly belongs: the leadership tier, the casually dressed executives, the guys with the jaw-dropping professional resumes. Better by far to decide the strategy by the directors and appoint someone who will adapt their methods to suit. If coaches were once chefs, they have become more akin to Deliveroo drivers: not responsible for the product, yet ultimately answerable if it arrives poorly or leaks out of the box.

In the meantime, a coach's role has become not about defining the vision and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the visible figurehead for a club they have minimal power to influence. Enzo Maresca takes a squad of very young players into the Champions League and secures domestic cups, and effectively is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic finds his standing damaged while those individuals who hired him continue to make errors indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Game: Accountability Only for the Few

And possibly on some microcosmic level this represents corporate governance at work: the rise of a gilded overclass who are infallible, whose decisions are always sacrosanct, whose mistakes can invariably be resolved by sacking without justification. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach only to fire them for using too much 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and later bin him for requiring too long. And most importantly be grateful; for your modest season ticket price rises, for the latest player acquisitions, for the fact that the grownups – however well qualified – are in charge.