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Turns out the manager endured a loss to Grimsby. He weathered losing a crucial continental showpiece versus a particularly poor Spurs sides in living memory. He withstood home defeats to domestic rivals, a lowly league position, his rigid approach, squandering the team's best academy products, a poor winning percentage, calling his team the worst in Manchester United history. But there was one adversary against whom Ruben Amorim was not permitted to tango. If you challenge the sporting director, you had better succeed.

Unfortunately, similar to numerous Premiership defender in Blackburn’s championship campaign, Amorim came at Jason Wilcox and seems to have missed. The most distracted of readers will notice the paradoxical situation: a coach who frequently berated at his players for losing one-on-one duels crumbling in the face of the intense pressure and formidable presence of one of England's top division's most intimidating sporting directors.

In truth, this whole painful saga appears to portray the director in a different perspective. It may have been easy, given his brief stint in a similar role with the Saints, to view him as little more than a functionary in the United exoskeleton: a man who owed his position largely to his close relationship with ex-colleague Omar Berrada as any verifiable talent. How wrong we all were. By masterfully outmanoeuvring the club's celebrated head coach, as he outmanoeuvred the hapless a previous executive earlier, he has proved himself to be among football's strategic masterminds: a strategic mind that the club's competitors will now be rightly wary.

A Strategic Conflict Regarding Formation and Ideology

To illustrate, it was the director who being involved in the leadership that appointed the 3-4-3 fundamentalist Amorim in the first place, was instrumental in trying to persuade Amorim to ditch his favored formation. Naturally, these entreaties were resisted. But perhaps these judgements hold greater authority when delivered from the mouth with the impeccable soccer background he possesses, a veteran of international appearances and a role in a championship team decades past.

Perhaps in time Jason Wilcox might agree to explain 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 compensation reduction clause activated. But Jason Wilcox speaks rarely publicly, and with very good reason. The real thinkers in football – men like him – function at a level exceeding our prosaic understanding. Were he to speak, most likely we would perceive is a series of ultrasonic blips and complex calculations. Desiring an explanation is not quite equivalent to being ready to comprehend it.

The Supreme Power Behind the Throne

But of course, in training our focus on the sporting director we are obscuring the real power behind the club's current leadership. Jason Wilcox is, after all, merely executing the commands of his superior the billionaire owner, who in private has made very clear his preference for a back four. It is reported, the owner has also suggested deploying the forward in a wing-back role. Ratcliffe is keen for United to embrace data science and analytics. Per reports, during a leadership summit soon after his investment, he declared that United’s style of play “will be determined by this group”.

Ultimately, Ratcliffe is a specialist in this technical footballing stuff, leveraging his previous experience in petrochemicals and sailing. Most importantly he remains incredibly rich, and it is known, the rich are the best of us: more insightful, more wise, more tactically astute, fundamentally superior. Whom else would you trust to manage an enlightened programme of cost-cutting, the building of a modern arena that looks similar to an abstract design, the signing of Benjamin Sesko?

A New Football Hierarchy: Directors Above Managers

This is a trend we are increasingly seeing in top-tier of the game. Historically, clubs foolishly entrusted big footballing decisions to subordinate staff like managers, scouts – even footballers. Perhaps it was once possible for a young, visionary coach with ideas and energy to go into an organization and see their vision supported to fruition. But how many businesses have such individuals established? How many large-scale layoffs have they overseen? Better by far to invest genuine authority where it rightly belongs: the leadership tier, the open-necked shirt brigade, the individuals with the jaw-dropping LinkedIn profiles. It is wiser to decide the tactics in the boardroom and hire a coach who can tailor their methods to suit. If managers were formerly chefs, they are now more like delivery personnel: not creating the product, but still ultimately answerable should it be delivered poorly or fails of the box.

Nowadays, their job is increasingly not about defining the vision and more about marketing it: the front-facing representative of the operation, the public face of an organisation they can do little to influence. Enzo Maresca leads a team of very young players into the Champions League and secures two medium-sized trophies, and effectively gets sacked for speaking out. Wilfried Nancy sees his reputation ruined whereas those individuals who hired him live to blunder indefinitely.

A Modern Corporate Football: Responsibility for the Few

And perhaps in a small way this is simply corporate governance at work: the rise of a gilded elite who can never be wrong, whose decisions remain sacrosanct, whose mistakes can always be resolved by sacking without explanation. Appoint the 3-4-3 coach and then dismiss them for using too much 3-4-3. Bring in the process guy and later bin them for taking excessive time. And above all show gratitude; for your modest season ticket price rises, for the latest player acquisitions, for the fact that the adults – regardless of their expertise – are in charge.