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Turns out Ruben Amorim could survive defeat by Grimsby. He weathered losing a crucial European final against a particularly poor Tottenham teams in living memory. He withstood home defeats to West Ham and Wolves, finishing 15th, his rigid approach, squandering some of the club’s most promising academy products, a poor winning percentage, calling the squad the poorest the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed one adversary with whom the Portuguese coach would not be allowed to tango. If you challenge the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, like many a Premiership defender during Blackburn Rovers' title-winning 1994-95 season, the coach came at Jason Wilcox and seems to have missed. The most casual observer will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who frequently berated at his players for failing in individual battles succumbing in the face of the intense pressure and formidable presence of one of the Premier League’s most intimidating sporting directors.

In truth, this entire bruising episode appears to portray Jason Wilcox in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been easy, given his brief stint in a similar role at Southampton, to regard Jason Wilcox as little more than a drudge within the club's structure: a man who owed his position largely to his close relationship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any verifiable talent. How wrong everyone was. In brilliantly outsmarting United’s feted manager, just as he bested the unfortunate Dan Ashworth before him, he has demonstrated as one of football's strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect that United’s competitors are now rightly wary.

A Strategic Conflict Over Formation and Ideology

To illustrate, it was the director , after being involved in the hierarchy that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach originally, was instrumental in trying to persuade Amorim to abandon his beloved formation. Naturally, these pleas faced pushback. But perhaps such directives hold greater authority when delivered from the mouth of a man the unimpeachable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, holder of three England caps and a role in a title-winning side decades past.

Maybe eventually Jason Wilcox might agree to outline his reasoning to the rest of us. Maybe one day questions may arise regarding why the coach is departing with a full payout, with no compensation reduction clause activated. The director speaks rarely in public, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals in football – individuals such as him – simply operate at a level beyond our own prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, probably we would perceive would be ultrasonic blips and complex calculations. Desiring an explanation is not the same as being prepared to comprehend it.

The Supreme Authority In Command

Naturally, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the true genius behind the club's current leadership. The director is, in reality, simply carrying out the directives of his superior the billionaire owner, who in private has emphasized his preference for a back four. It is reported, the owner has also suggested playing Bryan Mbeumo as a right wing-back. Ratcliffe is keen for United to adopt analytics and metrics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his investment, he announced that United’s style to football “shall be determined in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is a specialist in this technical football matters, drawing from his previous experience in petrochemicals and yachting. Above all he remains incredibly rich, and as we all know, the rich are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, more tactically astute, fundamentally better. Who else could one trust to oversee a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the building of a modern arena that looks a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

The New Football Hierarchy: Directors Over Coaches

This is a trend that is becoming prevalent in top-tier football. For decades, clubs foolishly delegated major sporting choices to subordinate staff such as coaches, talent spotters – players themselves. Maybe previously possible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and energy to go into an organization and see their vision supported to fruition. But how many companies have such individuals established? What number of large-scale layoffs have they overseen? Better by far to place the real power where it rightly belongs: the executive class, the casually dressed executives, the guys with the jaw-dropping LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to determine the strategy by the directors and hire a coach who can tailor their offering accordingly. If coaches were once chefs, they are now more akin to delivery personnel: not really creating the food, but still ultimately answerable should it be delivered cold or fails of the box.

In the meantime, their job is increasingly less about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing it: the receptionist of the operation, the visible figurehead for a club they can do little to influence. A coach at Chelsea leads a team of literal children into Europe and wins two medium-sized trophies, and effectively is dismissed for talking. Wilfried Nancy finds his standing damaged whereas the people who hired him continue to make errors another day.

A Modern Corporate Game: Accountability Only for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this is simply corporate governance at work: the elevation of a gilded elite who are infallible, whose choices are always untouchable, whose mistakes can always be sacked away 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 him for requiring too long. And above all show gratitude; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the reality that the grownups – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.