Darren Fletcher made over 340 appearances for Manchester United and won nearly everything; from Premier League titles to a Champions League trophy.
After a short playing career away from the club, he returned in a coaching role and he has been United's technical director since 2021.
The role of a technical director is crucial to a football club. They are senior members of the management group who have major influence over a club’s long-term strategy, and they are also entrusted with protecting or installing a playing philosophy. The use of a technical director has become popular among Premier League clubs, but few of them have entrusted the job to someone like Darren Fletcher.
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Technical directors tend to share many qualities with managers as a whole which inevitably means that they can do both jobs. We have seen that before with the likes of Ralf Rangnick who has had a career mixed with management and directing.
Fletcher began his non-playing career as an assistant coach for the United youth team before being promoted to a first-team assistant under Michael Carrick. But instead of looking for club management opportunities, like his former teammate who is now in charge at Middlesbrough, he was promoted to the directing job. For someone with relatively little experience, many fans may have been surprised to see the 38-year-old take on the role.
Ten Hag has had a terrific start to his Manchester United career, and many fans are happy to see a standard of football that has been missing from Old Trafford for years. While the Dutchman will be credited with the good work, it would be wise to think about Fletcher’s influence. Even with Rangnick, long-term plans were being laid out for the club, by himself and the former midfielder, and they are finally paying off.
Rangnick was very clear about the type of personnel that needed to leave the club, and under the supervision of Fletcher – they are now gone. United now have a professional and fiery spirit that was last seen under Sir Alex Ferguson. As well as this, the players that have been purchased with Fletcher on board have been massively successful, and he has been able to assist with the recruitment of quality and well-suited players.
Fletcher has taken a very unusual approach to the role and instead of staying behind the scenes, he has been very active in a coaching sense. You would expect to see a technical director in a suit, sitting in an office. Whereas Fletcher has been seen in the dugout on some match days, and he is usually coaching training sessions in a tracksuit. His hands-on approach is one similar to one of a head coach, which may be the end goal.
The careers of many managers are often intertwined with directing roles. Fletcher has every chance of moving into management if he wishes. He certainly proves that he has the ability to work as a coach by his work with United. However, much like Arsenal and their technical director – Edu, the club may owe a major part of their success to their director.
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