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Transpired the manager was able to withstand a loss to Grimsby. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece against a particularly poor Tottenham teams for many years. He could survive losing at home to domestic rivals, finishing 15th, an unwavering system, undermining some of the club’s best academy products, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. Yet, there existed one adversary against whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to dance. If you challenge Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

Regrettably, like many a Premiership defender in Blackburn’s championship campaign, Amorim took on the executive and seems to have failed. Even the most casual observer will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who frequently berated at his players for losing individual battles crumbling in the face of the intense pressure and formidable presence of a England's top division's most intimidating football executives.

And frankly, this entire bruising episode seems to paint the director in a different perspective. Perhaps it might have been tempting, given his nine months of experience at Southampton, to regard Jason Wilcox as merely a drudge in the United exoskeleton: an individual who owed his position as much to his friendship with his former boss Omar Berrada rather than any demonstrable skill. How mistaken everyone was. By masterfully outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless a previous executive earlier, Jason Wilcox has demonstrated as one of the sport’s true generals: a strategic mind of which the club's competitors will now be rightly wary.

The Strategic Conflict Regarding System and Philosophy

To illustrate, this was the director who having been part of the hierarchy that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist the coach in the first place, played a key role in trying to persuade Amorim to abandon his favored formation. Unsurprisingly, these entreaties faced pushback. But perhaps these judgements carry more weight when delivered by a man with the impeccable soccer background of Jason Wilcox, a veteran of international appearances and a contributor to a title-winning side from 31 years ago.

Maybe eventually Jason Wilcox might agree to outline his reasoning publicly. Perhaps at some point questions may arise regarding why the coach is walking away with full compensation, without any compensation reduction clause in place. The director speaks rarely publicly, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers in football – individuals such as him – function at a level beyond our own prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, most likely all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Wanting is not the same as being prepared to comprehend it.

The Supreme Authority Behind the Throne

Naturally, by focusing our attention on the sporting director we overlook the real power behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, after all, simply carrying out the commands of his line manager the billionaire owner, who in private has made very clear his desire for a four-man defense. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also suggested playing Bryan Mbeumo in a wing-back role. The owner is eager for the club to embrace data science and analytics. Per reports, in an executive meeting soon after his minority ownership, he announced that the team's approach to football “will be determined by this group”.

After all, Sir Jim is an expert in these intricate football matters, leveraging his previous experience in industry and sailing. Above all he is incredibly rich, and as we all know, the rich are the best of us: more insightful, more wise, more tactically astute, simply better. Whom else could one trust to oversee a strategic plan of cost-cutting, the construction of a new stadium that looks similar to someone’s leftover knitting, the signing of a new striker?

A New Football Hierarchy: Directors Over Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing in top-tier football. Historically, clubs foolishly entrusted big footballing decisions to low-level employees like managers, talent spotters – players themselves. Maybe previously feasible for a young, innovative manager with a philosophy and energy to join an organization and see their vision through to completion. But how many companies have such individuals set up? How many mass redundancies have they managed? Better by far to invest genuine authority where it rightly belongs: the executive class, the casually dressed executives, the guys with impressive LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to determine the tactics in the boardroom and hire a coach who can tailor their offering to suit. If managers were once chefs, they have become more akin to delivery personnel: not creating the product, yet finally accountable should it be delivered cold or fails of the box.

Nowadays, a coach's role is increasingly less about defining the vision and more about selling it: the receptionist of the operation, the visible figurehead for a club they have minimal power to change. A coach at Chelsea leads a team of literal children into the Champions League and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively gets sacked for speaking out. Wilfried Nancy sees his reputation ruined while the people who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Modern Corporate Football: Responsibility Only for the Coaches

And perhaps on some microcosmic level this is simply neoliberalism at work: the elevation of a privileged elite who can never be wrong, whose decisions remain untouchable, whose errors can invariably be sacked away without explanation. Hire the 3-4-3 coach only to fire him for using too much that system. Hire the project manager and then discard him for taking too long. And most importantly show gratitude; for the incremental season ticket price rises, for the latest summer signings, for the reality that the grownups – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.