The Coach's Fatal Error? Challenging Wilcox and an Infallible Executive Class

Tbecame clear Ruben Amorim could survive losing against Grimsby. He weathered an important European final against one of the worst Spurs sides in living memory. He could survive home defeats against domestic rivals, finishing 15th, the tactical inflexibility, squandering some of the club’s best homegrown talent, a poor winning percentage, calling his team the worst the club has ever seen. But there was one adversary with whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to engage. You come at Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

And frankly, this entire bruising episode appears to portray the director in a different perspective. It may have been easy, given his nine months in a similar role with the Saints, to regard him as merely a functionary within the club's structure: a man who owed his position as much to his friendship with his former boss Omar Berrada rather than any demonstrable skill. How wrong everyone was. In brilliantly outsmarting the club's celebrated manager, as he outmanoeuvred the unfortunate a previous executive earlier, Jason Wilcox has proved himself as one of the sport’s strategic masterminds: a strategic mind of which United’s mid-table rivals will now be justifiably concerned.

A Strategic Clash Over Formation and Philosophy

To illustrate, it was the director who being involved in the hierarchy that appointed the rigid 3-4-3 advocate the coach in the first place, was instrumental in trying to persuade him to abandon his beloved formation. Unsurprisingly, these pleas were resisted. However, such directives hold greater authority when delivered by a man of a man the unimpeachable football pedigree he possesses, holder of three England caps and a contributor to a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time he might agree to outline his reasoning publicly. Perhaps at some point he might be asked why Amorim is walking away with a full payout, without any compensation reduction clause in place. The director speaks rarely in public, for excellent reasons. The real thinkers of this sport – men like Jason Wilcox – simply operate on a plane beyond our own prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, probably all we would hear would be high-frequency signals and four-dimensional whirring. Wanting is not quite equivalent to being ready to receive.

The Ultimate Authority Behind Command

But of course, in training our focus on Jason Wilcox we overlook the true genius behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, in reality, merely executing the directives of his ultimate superior the billionaire owner, who privately has made very clear his preference for a four-man defense. It is reported, Ratcliffe has also proposed playing Bryan Mbeumo in a wing-back role. Ratcliffe is keen for United to adopt analytics and metrics. According to ESPN, during a leadership summit early in his investment, he declared that United’s style to football “shall be determined by this group”.

After all, Sir Jim is a specialist in this technical footballing stuff, drawing from his background in petrochemicals and yachting. Most importantly he is immensely wealthy, and it is known, the rich are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, strategically brilliant, fundamentally superior. Whom else would you trust to manage an enlightened programme of austerity, the building of a new stadium that appears a lot like an abstract design, the acquisition of Benjamin Sesko?

A New Soccer Hierarchy: Directors Over Coaches

This represents a shift we are increasingly seeing at the elite levels of the game. For decades, clubs foolishly delegated big footballing decisions to low-level employees like managers, scouts – players themselves. Perhaps it was once possible for a young, innovative manager with ideas and energy to go into a club and see their vision through to completion. But how many companies have such individuals set up? How many 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 decide the tactics in the boardroom and hire someone who will adapt their offering to suit. If managers were once chefs, they are now more akin to delivery personnel: not really creating the product, but still finally accountable if it arrives cold or leaks out to meet standards.

Nowadays, their job is increasingly less about crafting the philosophy and more about selling it: the receptionist of the operation, the public face of an organisation they can do little to change. Enzo Maresca leads a team of literal children into Europe and wins two medium-sized trophies, and effectively gets sacked for speaking out. A manager at Celtic finds his reputation ruined whereas those individuals who hired him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Game: Accountability for the Few

And perhaps on some microcosmic level this represents corporate governance at work: the elevation of a privileged overclass who are infallible, whose choices are always sacrosanct, whose mistakes can always be resolved by sacking without explanation. Appoint the system coach only to fire them for playing too much 3-4-3. Bring in the project manager and later bin him for taking too long. And most importantly be grateful; for the incremental increases in ticket costs, for the latest summer signings, for the fact that the grownups – however well qualified – are in charge.