🔗 Share this article

Tbecame clear Ruben Amorim was able to withstand a loss to lower-league opposition. Survive an important continental showpiece against a particularly poor Tottenham teams for many years. He withstood losing at home to West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, undermining the team's most promising academy products, a poor winning percentage, calling his team the poorest the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed one adversary against whom the Portuguese coach was not permitted to tango. You come at the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, like many a top-flight defender in Blackburn’s championship 1994-95 season, Amorim took on the executive and seems to have failed. The most distracted of readers will notice the irony here: a manager who frequently berated his squad for losing individual battles succumbing when confronted by the white heat and formidable presence of one of England's top division's most intimidating sporting directors.

In truth, this entire painful saga 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 him as little more than a functionary within the club's structure: an individual whose appointment was due largely to his close relationship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any verifiable talent. How mistaken everyone was. In brilliantly outmanoeuvring United’s feted head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth earlier, he has demonstrated to be among football's true generals: a tactical intellect that United’s mid-table rivals are now rightly wary.

The Strategic Clash Over System and Ideology

For example, it was the director who being involved in the hierarchy that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach originally, played a key role in attempting to convince Amorim to abandon his beloved 3-4-3. Naturally, these entreaties met a certain resistance. However, such directives carry more weight when issued from the mouth of a man the unimpeachable soccer background he possesses, a veteran of international appearances and a role in a title-winning side decades past.

Perhaps in time he may be persuaded to outline his reasoning to the rest of us. Maybe one day he might be asked regarding why the coach is departing with a full payout, with no compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks publicly, and with very good reason. The real thinkers in football – men like Jason Wilcox – function on a plane exceeding our mundane comprehension. Were he to speak, probably all we would hear would be ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not equivalent to being prepared to receive.

The Supreme Power Behind Command

Naturally, in training our focus on the sporting director we are obscuring the real power behind the club's current leadership. The director is, in reality, simply carrying out the commands of his ultimate superior the billionaire owner, who in private has emphasized his desire for a four-man defense. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also suggested deploying the forward as a right wing-back. Ratcliffe is keen for United to adopt data science and analytics. Per reports, in an executive meeting early in his minority ownership, he announced that United’s style of play “shall be determined in this room”.

Ultimately, Sir Jim is an expert in these intricate footballing stuff, leveraging his background in petrochemicals and sailing. Most importantly he remains immensely wealthy, and as we all know, the wealthy are superior: more insightful, more wise, more tactically astute, simply better. Who else could one trust to manage an enlightened programme of austerity, the construction of a new stadium that looks a lot like an abstract design, the signing of Benjamin Sesko?

A Modern Soccer Hierarchy: Executives Over Managers

This represents a shift that is becoming prevalent in top-tier of the game. Historically, clubs foolishly entrusted major sporting choices to low-level employees such as coaches, talent spotters – players themselves. Maybe previously feasible for an up-and-coming, visionary coach with a philosophy and drive to go into an organization and see their vision supported to fruition. 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 guys with impressive professional resumes. Better by far to determine the tactics in the boardroom and hire someone who will adapt their methods accordingly. If coaches were formerly chefs, they have become more akin to Deliveroo drivers: not creating the food, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered poorly or leaks out of the box.

Nowadays, their job has become not about crafting the philosophy and more about marketing 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 wins domestic cups, and effectively is dismissed for speaking out. Wilfried Nancy finds his reputation ruined whereas those individuals who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Football: Responsibility for the Coaches

And possibly in a small way this is simply neoliberalism at work: the rise of a gilded overclass who are infallible, whose choices are always untouchable, whose mistakes can always be sacked away without explanation. Appoint the system coach only to dismiss him for playing excessively 3-4-3. Bring in the process guy and later bin him for requiring too long. And most importantly show gratitude; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for your new summer signings, for the reality that the grownups – however well qualified – are in charge.