Football, as with most professional sports, has long been recognized as a business as much as a sport. The transfer window of summer 2016 gives incontrovertible evidence supporting this, but it was obvious years ago.

What is confusing however is how success within football is not measured the way success in business is. I suspect that the people quickest to turn on a player, or much more relevantly a manager, are perhaps people who themselves have either not become particularly successful in business, or simply have never had serious challenges to overcome in their own lives.

Success in football is more of a challenge than business, as in business if we struggle Monday, we can try and kill it Tuesday and all will be anew. In football of course, one bad week can be three straight losses. Worse yet, you need to wait six days before you can attempt to correct your wrong.

Louis van Gaal, for all his failings at United, can never be described as a person who caves in to pressure. He failed miserably at United for a variety of reasons, and in a variety of ways, but a lack of hubris to handle the pressure at United was never one of his failings. However, with that in mind, there were moments of facial expression that seemed all too familiar to the deer-in-headlights David Moyes when he appeared the man who personified biting off more than you can chew. Van Gaal, despite an ego that could keep the titanic afloat, looked like he could not believe the weight he was under.

Why should Mourinho be any different? He has, like Van Gaal, a stellar track record of proven success, and an ideal ego well-suited to handle a major global club.

Anyone who has ever been repeatedly promoted and given more responsibility has learned that this is the very definition of a process. You begin with excitement at landing the job. Then you start the job, are in awe of the magnitude and start to believe they hired the wrong person. You come through this and start to figure it out. You then succeed. In business this process, depending on the scale of the promotion (higher up, the more learning), can take anywhere from 6-18 months. Managing Manchester United is a promotion for Jose Mourinho. If you disagree with that, ask yourself, do you think he considered it a promotion? A target obtained? Yes, Chelsea, Inter Milan, and of course Real Madrid are big, glorious clubs. I have no issue with any of them. I even like Porto. But Manchester United are unlike every other football club on the planet. Not better, not more important for the game, not more successful necessarily. However, there are few humans on this planet who when asked to complete the sentence: “Manchester…” would not end with …”United” even if they have not seen a football in their life. Managing Manchester United is akin to God watching your performance and evaluating it second by second.

We, as fans of football, and United, cannot begin to imagine the enormous pressure Mourinho is feeling right now. This will take time. As he understands the vast landscape in which he now operates, he will feel the confidence to make bold, unilateral decisions. Right now he thinks keeping Rooney in the team, despite pressure to drop, shows a sign of strength; he’s not allowing outside influences to affect his decisions. When he no longer is aware of outside influences in any capacity, and strikes out on his own, we will see a glorious United again. But this will take support, and patience. Just like any promotion we receive in business. Football is a business right?