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Turns out the manager endured losing against lower-league opposition. He weathered an important continental showpiece versus one of the worst Tottenham teams in living memory. He could survive home defeats to West Ham and Wolves, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, laying waste to some of the club’s most promising academy products, the 32% win rate, calling the squad the poorest in Manchester United history. But there was a single opponent with whom the Portuguese coach was not permitted to dance. You come at Jason Wilcox, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, similar to numerous Premiership defender during Blackburn Rovers' title-winning 1994-95 season, Amorim came at the executive and appears to have missed. Even the most casual observer will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who often railed his squad for failing in one-on-one duels succumbing in the face of the intense pressure and formidable presence of a England's top division's most feared sporting directors.

And frankly, this whole painful saga 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 Jason Wilcox as little more than a drudge in the United exoskeleton: an individual whose appointment was due 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 a previous executive earlier, he has proved himself as one of the sport’s strategic masterminds: a strategic mind of which the club's competitors are now justifiably concerned.

The Tactical Conflict Over System & Ideology

To illustrate, it was the director who being involved in the hierarchy that hired the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim originally, played a key role in attempting to convince Amorim to ditch his beloved formation. Unsurprisingly, these pleas were resisted. But perhaps these judgements hold greater authority when issued by a man of a man the unimpeachable football pedigree of Jason Wilcox, holder of international appearances and a contributor to a championship team from 31 years ago.

Perhaps in time Jason Wilcox may be persuaded to outline his reasoning publicly. Maybe one day questions may arise why Amorim is walking away with a full payout, without any penalty clause activated. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely publicly, and with very good reason. The real thinkers in football – individuals such as him – function at a level beyond our own prosaic understanding. If he ever did speak, most likely all we would hear is a series of high-frequency signals and complex calculations. Wanting is not quite equivalent to being prepared to comprehend it.

The Ultimate Authority Behind the Throne

Naturally, 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 commands of his ultimate line manager Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who privately has made very clear his desire 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 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 “shall be determined in this room”.

After all, Ratcliffe is an expert in these intricate footballing stuff, leveraging his background in petrochemicals and yachting. Above all he is incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are superior: more perceptive, sagacious, strategically brilliant, fundamentally superior. Whom else could one trust to manage an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the building of a modern arena that appears a lot like an abstract design, the signing of a new striker?

A New Football Order: Directors Over Coaches

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing in top-tier football. For decades, clubs foolishly entrusted big footballing decisions to subordinate staff such as coaches, talent spotters – players themselves. Maybe previously possible for an up-and-coming, visionary coach with a philosophy and drive to join an organization and see their vision supported to fruition. But how many businesses have these guys established? What number of mass redundancies have they managed? Better by far to place the real power where it rightly belongs: the executive class, the casually dressed executives, the guys with impressive LinkedIn profiles. Better by far to decide the tactics in the boardroom and hire someone who can tailor their methods to suit. If coaches were once chefs, they are now more akin to delivery personnel: not creating the food, but still finally accountable if it arrives poorly or leaks out to meet standards.

Nowadays, a coach's role has become less about defining the vision and more about selling it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the visible figurehead of an organisation they have minimal power to change. Enzo Maresca leads a team of literal children into Europe and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively is dismissed for talking. A manager at Celtic sees his reputation ruined while the people who appointed him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Neoliberal Football: Responsibility for the Coaches

And possibly in a small way this is simply neoliberalism at work: the rise of a privileged elite who are infallible, whose decisions are always sacrosanct, whose mistakes can always be sacked away without explanation. Hire the 3-4-3 coach and then fire him for playing too much 3-4-3. Hire the project manager and later discard them 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 – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.