🔗 Share this article

Itbecame clear he was able to withstand a loss to lower-league opposition. Survive an important continental showpiece versus one of the worst Tottenham teams in living memory. He could survive home defeats to domestic rivals, finishing 15th, an unwavering system, laying waste to the team's most promising academy products, the 32% win rate, labeling his team the poorest in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed a single opponent with whom the Portuguese coach would not be allowed to engage. You come at the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, like many a Premiership right-back during Blackburn Rovers' championship 1994-95 season, Amorim came at the executive and appears to have failed. Even the most casual observer can see the paradoxical situation: a coach who often railed at his players for failing in one-on-one duels succumbing in the face of the white heat and animal charisma of a England's top division's most intimidating football executives.

And frankly, this entire painful saga seems to paint the director in a whole new light. It may have been easy, given his nine months in a similar role with the Saints, to regard Jason Wilcox as little more than a functionary within the club's structure: a man whose appointment was due largely to his close relationship with ex-colleague a fellow executive rather than any demonstrable skill. How mistaken we all were. By masterfully outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated manager, just as he bested the unfortunate Dan Ashworth earlier, Jason Wilcox has proved himself to be among football's strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect of which the club's competitors will now be rightly wary.

The Strategic Conflict Regarding System & Ideology

For example, it was Jason Wilcox , after having been part of the leadership that hired the rigid 3-4-3 advocate Amorim originally, was instrumental in attempting to convince Amorim to ditch his favored formation. Naturally, these entreaties met a certain resistance. However, these judgements hold greater authority when issued by a man of a man the impeccable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of international appearances and a role in a championship team decades past.

Maybe eventually Jason Wilcox might agree to outline his thought processes to the rest of us. Maybe one day questions may arise why Amorim is walking away with a full payout, without any penalty clause in place. But Jason Wilcox seldom speaks publicly, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers in football – individuals such as Jason Wilcox – simply operate at a level exceeding our mundane comprehension. If he ever did speak, probably we would perceive is a series of high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Wanting is not equivalent to being prepared to receive.

An Supreme Power In the Throne

But of course, in training our focus on the sporting director we overlook the real power behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, in reality, merely executing the commands of his line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who in private has emphasized his desire for a back four. According to reports, Ratcliffe has also proposed deploying the forward in a wing-back role. Ratcliffe is keen for United to adopt data science and metrics. Per reports, in an executive meeting early in his minority ownership, he declared that the team's approach of play “will be decided in this room”.

Ultimately, Ratcliffe is a specialist in this technical football matters, leveraging his background in petrochemicals and yachting. Most importantly he is incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, more tactically astute, simply better. Who else could one trust to oversee an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the building of a modern arena that appears a lot like someone’s leftover knitting, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

The Modern Football Order: Executives Above Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels of the game. For decades, teams mistakenly delegated big footballing decisions to low-level employees such as coaches, talent spotters – even footballers. Maybe previously possible for a young, innovative manager with a philosophy and drive to go into an organization and implement their plan supported to fruition. Yet how many businesses have such individuals established? How many mass redundancies have they managed? Far preferable to invest the real power where it belongs: the leadership tier, the casually dressed executives, the individuals with impressive professional resumes. Better by far to determine the tactics by the directors and hire a coach who can tailor their offering to suit. If managers were formerly chefs, they are now more akin to delivery personnel: not really responsible for the product, but still ultimately answerable should it be delivered cold or fails 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 visible figurehead of an organisation they can do little to influence. Enzo Maresca takes a squad of very young players into the Champions League and secures domestic cups, and essentially is dismissed for talking. Wilfried Nancy finds his reputation ruined whereas those individuals who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Football: Accountability for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this represents corporate governance in action: the elevation of a privileged overclass who are infallible, whose choices remain untouchable, whose errors can always be sacked away without explanation. Hire the 3-4-3 coach and then fire them for using excessively 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and later discard him for requiring too long. And above all show gratitude; for your modest increases in ticket costs, for the latest player acquisitions, for the reality that the adults – regardless of their expertise – remain in control.