🔗 Share this article

Turns out the manager could survive defeat by Grimsby. Survive a decisive continental showpiece versus one of the worst Tottenham teams in living memory. He could survive losing at home to West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, the tactical inflexibility, undermining some of the club’s best academy products, the 32% win rate, calling his team the poorest the club has ever seen. Yet, there existed one adversary with whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to engage. You come at the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Regrettably, like many a Premiership right-back during Blackburn Rovers' championship 1994-95 season, Amorim took on the executive and appears to have failed. Even the most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who often railed at his players for losing individual battles crumbling when confronted by the white heat and animal charisma of one of England's top division's most intimidating football executives.

In truth, this entire painful saga seems to paint the director in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been tempting, given his brief stint of experience at Southampton, to regard him as merely a functionary in the United exoskeleton: a man whose appointment was due largely to his friendship with his former boss a fellow executive rather than any demonstrable skill. How wrong everyone was. In brilliantly outsmarting United’s feted head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless Dan Ashworth earlier, he has demonstrated to be among football's strategic masterminds: a strategic mind of which United’s competitors will now be rightly wary.

A Tactical Clash Regarding System and Ideology

For example, it was the director who having been part of the leadership that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim in the first place, was instrumental in trying to persuade Amorim to abandon his favored 3-4-3. Naturally, these pleas were resisted. But perhaps these judgements carry more weight when delivered by a man with the impeccable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of international appearances and a role in a title-winning side from 31 years ago.

Maybe eventually he may be persuaded to explain his thought processes to the rest of us. Perhaps at some point he might be asked regarding why the coach is walking away with full compensation, with no compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely publicly, and with very good reason. The real thinkers of this sport – men like Jason Wilcox – simply operate on a plane exceeding our prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, probably all we would hear is a series of ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not equivalent to being prepared to receive.

The Supreme Authority In the Throne

Naturally, in training our focus on the sporting director we overlook the true genius behind the modern United throne. Jason Wilcox is, after all, merely executing the directives of his line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has made very clear his preference for a four-man defense. It is reported, the owner has also suggested deploying the forward as a right wing-back. Ratcliffe is keen for the club to adopt analytics and metrics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting early in his minority ownership, he declared that United’s style of play “will be decided by this group”.

After all, Sir Jim is a specialist in these intricate footballing stuff, leveraging his background in industry and yachting. Most importantly he remains immensely wealthy, and it is known, the wealthy are the best of us: more perceptive, more wise, more tactically astute, simply superior. Whom else could one trust to oversee an enlightened programme of austerity, the building of a modern arena that appears a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of a new striker?

A Modern Soccer Order: Directors Over Coaches

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels of the game. For decades, teams mistakenly entrusted major sporting choices to subordinate staff such as coaches, scouts – even footballers. Perhaps it was once possible for an up-and-coming, visionary coach with ideas and drive to go into an organization and implement their plan through to completion. But how many businesses have such individuals set up? What number of mass redundancies have they overseen? Far preferable to invest genuine authority where it belongs: the leadership tier, the casually dressed executives, the individuals with impressive LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to decide the tactics in the boardroom and appoint someone who can tailor their methods accordingly. If managers were formerly chefs, they have become more akin to delivery personnel: not really responsible for the food, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered cold or fails to meet standards.

Nowadays, their job is increasingly less about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the visible figurehead of an organisation they can do little to influence. A coach at Chelsea leads a team of very young players into the Champions League and secures domestic cups, and essentially gets sacked for talking. A manager at Celtic finds his standing damaged whereas the people who appointed him continue to make errors another day.

A Modern Corporate Football: Responsibility for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this represents corporate governance at work: the rise of a privileged elite who are infallible, whose choices are always sacrosanct, whose errors can always be resolved by sacking without explanation. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach only to fire him for using excessively that system. Hire the project manager and then discard him for taking excessive time. And above all show gratitude; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for your new player acquisitions, for the reality that the grownups – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.