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Itbecame clear the manager could survive defeat by Grimsby. Survive an important European final against one of the worst Spurs sides for many years. He withstood losing at home against domestic rivals, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, squandering the team's most promising academy products, a poor winning percentage, labeling his team the poorest in Manchester United history. But there was a single opponent against whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to tango. If you challenge Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, like many a top-flight defender in Blackburn’s championship 1994-95 season, the coach took on Jason Wilcox and seems to have failed. The most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a manager who frequently berated at his players for losing one-on-one duels succumbing in the face of the white heat and formidable presence of one of the Premier League’s most intimidating sporting directors.

In truth, this entire bruising episode seems to paint Jason Wilcox in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been easy, given 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 close relationship with ex-colleague a fellow executive as any demonstrable skill. How mistaken we all were. In brilliantly outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated head coach, just as he bested the unfortunate a previous executive earlier, he has demonstrated to be among football's strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect of which the club's competitors will now be rightly wary.

A Strategic Clash Regarding System and Ideology

For example, it was Jason Wilcox who having been part of the hierarchy that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach in the first place, played a key role in trying to persuade him to ditch his beloved formation. Naturally, these entreaties were resisted. But perhaps these judgements carry more weight when delivered from the mouth of a man the unimpeachable soccer background he possesses, holder of international appearances and a role in a championship team decades past.

Maybe eventually he may be persuaded to explain his reasoning to the rest of us. Maybe one day questions may arise why Amorim is walking away with full compensation, with no penalty clause in place. The director speaks rarely publicly, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers of this sport – individuals such as him – function on a plane beyond our own prosaic understanding. Were he to 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 receive.

An Supreme Authority Behind Command

Naturally, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the real power behind the club's current leadership. The director is, in reality, merely executing the commands of his ultimate line manager the billionaire owner, who in private has made very clear his desire for a four-man defense. According to reports, the owner has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for United to adopt analytics and metrics. Per reports, in an executive meeting soon after his investment, he declared that the team's approach to football “shall be decided in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is a specialist in this technical football matters, drawing from his previous experience in petrochemicals and sailing. Most importantly he is incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are superior: more insightful, sagacious, strategically brilliant, simply superior. Whom else would you trust to oversee a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the building of a modern arena that looks a lot like an abstract design, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A New Football Hierarchy: Directors Above Managers

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing in top-tier of the game. Historically, teams mistakenly entrusted major sporting choices to low-level employees like managers, scouts – even footballers. Perhaps it was once feasible for a young, visionary coach with ideas and drive to go into 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? Far preferable to invest the real power where it rightly belongs: the leadership tier, the casually dressed executives, the guys with impressive professional resumes. Better by far to decide the strategy in the boardroom and appoint a coach who will adapt their offering to suit. If coaches were formerly chefs, they have become more akin to delivery personnel: not creating the product, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered poorly or fails of the box.

In the meantime, their job is increasingly not about defining the vision and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative on the front desk, the public face of an organisation they can do little to influence. A coach at Chelsea takes a squad of literal children into the Champions League and secures domestic cups, and effectively is dismissed for speaking out. A manager at Celtic sees his standing damaged while the people who appointed him live to blunder another day.

A Neoliberal Football: Accountability Only for the Coaches

And possibly on some microcosmic level this represents neoliberalism in action: the elevation of a gilded elite who are infallible, whose choices are always untouchable, whose errors can invariably be sacked away without justification. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach only to fire them for using too much that system. Hire the process guy and then bin them for requiring too long. And above all be grateful; for the incremental season ticket price rises, for the latest summer signings, for the reality that the grownups – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.