Phil Neville’s immediate re-hiring by Inter Miami after walking away from the Portland Timbers in 13th place is not a second chance—it is a regulatory failure that exposes a closed-loop crony culture unwilling to hold itself accountable. When Neville resigned from Portland in July 2024, he admitted that results “did not match expectations,” a polite acknowledgment of a team that had lost its identity under his stewardship. The Timbers conceded 41 goals in 24 matches during his tenure, a defensive record that would have embarrassed a USL side. Yet within weeks of that confession, Neville was back in south Florida, seamlessly re-integrated into the Inter Miami technical staff as if his 13th-place finish were a minor hiccup rather than a damning indictment of his tactical acumen. In no other major soccer league would a manager who voluntarily quit a playoff-contending job (Portland was three points off the line when he left) be immediately handed another role within the same ownership network. The absence of a centralized coaching registry, minimum performance thresholds, or even a cooling-off period between appointments allows clubs like Miami to treat managerial positions as family favors rather than meritocratic hires.
The evidence of this cronyism runs deep through Inter Miami’s DNA