🔗 Share this article

Tbecame clear Ruben Amorim was able to withstand defeat by lower-league opposition. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece against one of the worst Spurs sides for many years. He could survive losing at home to domestic rivals, a lowly league position, an unwavering system, laying waste to some of the club’s best academy products, a poor winning percentage, labeling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed one adversary with whom the Portuguese coach would not be allowed to tango. You come at the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, like many a top-flight defender in Blackburn’s championship campaign, the coach came at Jason Wilcox and seems to have failed. Even the most distracted of readers will notice the irony here: a coach who frequently berated at his players for failing in one-on-one duels crumbling when confronted by the white heat and formidable presence of a the Premier League’s most feared football executives.

And frankly, this whole painful saga seems to paint Jason Wilcox in a whole new light. It may have been easy, given his nine months in a similar role at Southampton, to view him as little more than 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 verifiable talent. How mistaken everyone was. In brilliantly outsmarting United’s feted head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the unfortunate a previous executive before him, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated to be among the sport’s strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect of which United’s competitors will now be justifiably concerned.

A Strategic Clash Regarding System & Philosophy

To illustrate, it was Jason Wilcox who having been part of the leadership that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim in the first place, was instrumental in attempting to convince Amorim to ditch his beloved formation. Naturally, these entreaties faced pushback. But perhaps such directives carry more weight when issued 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.

Perhaps in time he may be persuaded to outline his thought processes publicly. Maybe one day questions may arise why Amorim is departing with full compensation, without any compensation reduction clause activated. The director speaks rarely in public, for excellent reasons. The true intellectuals in football – men like him – simply operate at a level exceeding our mundane comprehension. Were he to speak, most likely we would perceive would be high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Desiring an explanation is not quite the same as being ready to comprehend it.

The Supreme Authority In the Throne

But of course, by focusing our attention on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the real power behind the modern United throne. Jason Wilcox is, after all, simply carrying out the directives of his ultimate line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who privately has made very clear his preference 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 analytics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his investment, he announced that the team's approach of play “shall be determined in this room”.

Ultimately, Ratcliffe is an expert in these intricate football matters, drawing from his background in petrochemicals and sailing. Most importantly he remains incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are superior: more insightful, sagacious, more tactically astute, simply better. Who else could one trust to manage an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the building of a new stadium that appears a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of a new striker?

A Modern Soccer Order: Directors Above Managers

This is a trend that is becoming prevalent at the elite levels football. For decades, clubs foolishly entrusted big footballing decisions to low-level employees like managers, scouts – players themselves. Perhaps it was once possible for a young, visionary coach with a philosophy and drive to join a club and implement their plan through to completion. Yet how many businesses have such individuals set up? How many mass redundancies have they overseen? Better by far to invest the real power where it belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with the jaw-dropping professional resumes. It is wiser to determine the tactics in the boardroom and appoint someone who can tailor their methods accordingly. If managers were once chefs, they have become more like delivery personnel: not really creating the product, but still ultimately answerable if it arrives cold or leaks out to meet standards.

Nowadays, a coach's role has become less about defining the vision and more about selling it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the public face of an organisation they can do little to influence. A coach at Chelsea takes a squad of literal children into Europe and secures two medium-sized trophies, and essentially is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic finds his standing damaged while those individuals who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Modern Corporate Football: Accountability for the Few

And possibly in a small way this is simply corporate governance at work: the rise of a gilded elite who can never be wrong, whose decisions remain untouchable, whose mistakes can always be sacked away without explanation. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach and then dismiss him for using excessively that system. Bring in the project manager and then bin them for requiring too long. And most importantly be grateful; for your modest season ticket price rises, for the latest summer signings, for the fact that the grownups – however well qualified – are in charge.