🔗 Share this article

Iturns out Ruben Amorim could survive defeat by Grimsby. Survive losing a crucial European final versus a particularly poor Tottenham teams for many years. He could survive home defeats to domestic rivals, a lowly league position, an unwavering system, squandering the team's best academy products, the 32% win rate, calling his team the worst in Manchester United history. But there was a single opponent against whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to engage. If you challenge the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, similar to numerous Premiership right-back during Blackburn Rovers' championship campaign, the coach came at the executive and seems to have failed. Even the most casual observer can see the paradoxical situation: a coach who often railed his squad for failing in individual battles crumbling when confronted by the white heat and animal charisma of one of the Premier League’s most feared football executives.

In truth, this entire painful saga seems to paint Jason Wilcox in a whole new light. It may have been easy, given his brief stint of experience at Southampton, to view Jason Wilcox as merely a functionary within the club's structure: an individual who owed his position as much to his friendship with his former boss Omar Berrada as any verifiable talent. How mistaken we all were. By masterfully outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the unfortunate Dan Ashworth earlier, he has demonstrated as one of football's true generals: a strategic mind that United’s mid-table rivals are now justifiably concerned.

A Strategic Conflict Regarding System and Philosophy

For example, it was Jason Wilcox , after being involved in the hierarchy that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim originally, played a key role in trying to persuade Amorim to abandon his beloved 3-4-3. Unsurprisingly, these pleas were resisted. But perhaps these judgements hold greater authority when delivered by a man with the unimpeachable soccer background he possesses, a veteran of three England caps and a role in a championship team decades past.

Maybe eventually he may be persuaded to outline his reasoning publicly. Maybe one day he might be asked why Amorim is walking away with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause in place. The director seldom speaks publicly, and with very good reason. The true intellectuals of this sport – individuals such as Jason Wilcox – function on a plane beyond our own prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, most likely we would perceive would be high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Desiring an explanation is not equivalent to being ready to receive.

The Ultimate Power In Command

But of course, by focusing our attention on Jason Wilcox we are obscuring the true genius behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, after all, merely executing the commands of his ultimate line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has emphasized his desire for a back four. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also suggested playing Bryan Mbeumo in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for the club to adopt analytics and analytics. Per reports, in an executive meeting soon after his minority ownership, he announced that the team's approach of play “shall be decided in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is a specialist in these intricate footballing stuff, drawing from his previous experience in petrochemicals and sailing. Most importantly he remains incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are superior: more insightful, sagacious, strategically brilliant, fundamentally better. Who else would you trust to oversee an enlightened programme of austerity, the building of a new stadium that appears similar to an abstract design, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A New Soccer Order: Directors Above Coaches

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing in top-tier of the game. Historically, teams mistakenly delegated big footballing decisions to subordinate staff such as coaches, talent spotters – players themselves. Perhaps it was once feasible for an up-and-coming, innovative manager with ideas and energy to go into a club and see their vision supported to fruition. Yet how many companies have such individuals set up? What number of mass redundancies have they overseen? Better by far to place the real power where it rightly belongs: the leadership tier, the casually dressed executives, the individuals with the jaw-dropping LinkedIn profiles. It is wiser to determine the tactics by the directors and hire someone who can tailor their methods accordingly. If coaches were once chefs, they are now more akin to Deliveroo drivers: not really creating the product, yet ultimately answerable should it be delivered cold or fails of the box.

Nowadays, their job has become less about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the receptionist of the operation, the public face for a club they can do little to influence. A coach at Chelsea takes a squad of literal children into Europe and wins two medium-sized trophies, and essentially is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic finds his standing damaged whereas the people who appointed him live to blunder another day.

The Modern Corporate Football: Responsibility Only for the Coaches

And perhaps on some microcosmic level this represents corporate governance at work: the rise of a privileged overclass who can never be wrong, whose decisions remain sacrosanct, whose mistakes can always be resolved by sacking without explanation. Hire the system coach only to dismiss them for playing excessively that system. Hire the process guy and later bin them for taking excessive time. And most importantly show gratitude; for your modest increases in ticket costs, for the latest summer signings, for the fact that the grownups – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.