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Iturns out Ruben Amorim was able to withstand losing against Grimsby. He weathered a decisive continental showpiece versus a particularly poor Tottenham teams in living memory. He withstood losing at home against domestic rivals, finishing 15th, an unwavering system, undermining the team's most promising homegrown talent, the 32% win rate, calling his team the worst the club has ever seen. But there was a single opponent against whom the Portuguese coach would not be allowed to dance. If you challenge the sporting director, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, similar to numerous Premiership right-back in Blackburn’s championship 1994-95 season, Amorim took on the executive and seems to have missed. The most distracted of readers will notice the irony here: a manager who frequently berated at his players for failing in individual battles succumbing in the face of the white heat and formidable presence of one of England's top division's most feared football executives.

In truth, this entire bruising episode seems to paint the director in a whole new light. Perhaps it might have been easy, given his nine months in a similar role with the Saints, to view him as little more than a drudge in the United exoskeleton: a man whose appointment was due largely to his friendship with ex-colleague a fellow executive as any verifiable talent. How wrong we all were. In brilliantly outsmarting the club's celebrated head coach, just as he bested the hapless Dan Ashworth before him, he has proved himself as one of the sport’s strategic masterminds: a tactical intellect that the club's competitors are now justifiably concerned.

The Strategic Clash Over System and Philosophy

To illustrate, it was the director who having been part of the hierarchy that hired the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim in the first place, played a key role in trying to persuade Amorim to ditch his favored formation. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties were resisted. However, such directives carry more weight when delivered by a man of a man the impeccable soccer background of Jason Wilcox, holder of three England caps and a contributor to a title-winning side decades past.

Perhaps in time he may be persuaded to outline his reasoning publicly. Perhaps at some point he might be asked regarding why the coach is walking away with a full payout, with no penalty clause activated. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely publicly, and with very good reason. The true intellectuals of this sport – men like him – function on a plane exceeding our prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, probably all we would hear would be ultrasonic blips and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not the same as being ready to comprehend it.

An Ultimate Authority Behind Command

Naturally, by focusing our attention on Jason Wilcox we overlook the true genius behind the modern United throne. The director is, after all, simply carrying out the directives of his superior the billionaire owner, who in private has made very clear his preference for a four-man defense. According to reports, the owner has also proposed deploying the forward in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for the club to embrace analytics and analytics. According to ESPN, in an executive meeting soon after his minority ownership, he announced that United’s style of play “shall be determined in this room”.

After all, Sir Jim is a specialist in this technical football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and yachting. Above all he remains incredibly rich, and it is known, the wealthy are superior: more insightful, more wise, strategically brilliant, simply better. Whom else could one trust to oversee an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the building of a new stadium that looks a lot like an abstract design, the acquisition of a new striker?

The New Football Hierarchy: Directors Above Managers

This represents a shift that is becoming prevalent in top-tier of the game. For decades, teams mistakenly delegated major sporting choices to subordinate staff such as coaches, scouts – players themselves. Maybe previously feasible for a young, innovative manager with a philosophy and energy to join a club and see their vision supported to fruition. But how many businesses have such individuals set up? What number of mass redundancies have they overseen? Far preferable to invest the real power where it belongs: the executive class, the open-necked shirt brigade, the guys with impressive professional resumes. It is wiser to determine the strategy in the boardroom and hire someone who can tailor their methods to suit. If coaches were once chefs, they have become more like delivery personnel: not really responsible for the food, yet finally accountable should it be delivered poorly or fails of the box.

Nowadays, their job is increasingly less about defining the vision and more about selling it: the front-facing representative on the front desk, the visible figurehead of an organisation they have minimal power to change. Enzo Maresca leads a team of very young players into Europe and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively is dismissed for talking. Wilfried Nancy sees his standing damaged while those individuals who hired him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Game: Responsibility for the Coaches

And perhaps in a small way this represents corporate governance in action: the elevation of a privileged overclass who can never be wrong, whose decisions are always untouchable, whose errors can always be sacked away without justification. Hire the system coach only to fire them for playing too much 3-4-3. Hire the process guy and then discard him for requiring excessive time. And above all show gratitude; for your modest season ticket price rises, for your new player acquisitions, for the reality that the adults – however well qualified – remain in control.