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Picture the following: a happy Rasmus Højlund wearing Napoli's colors. Next, juxtapose that with a sad-looking Benjamin Sesko sporting United's jersey, looking as if he's missed an open goal. Do not worry finding an actual photo of him missing; background information is your adversary. Then, add statistics in a big, comical font. Don't forget the emojis. Post it across all platforms.

Would you mention that Højlund's goal count includes strikes in the Champions League while Sesko isn't playing in continental tournaments? Of course not. Nor would you note that four of the Dane's goals came against Belarus and Greece, or that Denmark is far superior to Slovenia and creates many more scoring opportunities. You run social media for a large outlet, raw engagement is what pays the bills, Manchester United are the prime target, and nuance is your sworn enemy.

Thus the cycle of online material turns. Your next task is to scan a 44-minute podcast with Peter Schmeichel and extract the part where he describes the signing of Sesko "strange". Just before, where Schmeichel prefaces his remarks by saying, "I have nothing bad to say about Benjamin Sesko"... yes, cut that. No one needs that. Simply ensure "strange" and "Sesko" appear together in the title. The audience will be furious.

The Season of Promise and Premature Judgment

Mid-autumn has traditionally one of my preferred times to observe football. The leaves swirl, winds shift, the teams and tactics are newly formed, everything is new and yet everything is beginning to form. Key players of the coming months are staking their claims. The transfer window is shut. No one is mentioning the multiple trophies yet. All teams are still in the game. At this precise point, anything is possible.

However, for similar reasons, this period has also been one of my least favourite times to consume news on football. Because although nothing has yet been settled, something must always be getting settled. The City winger is resurgent. Florian Wirtz has been a crushing disappointment. Could Semenyo be the top performer in the league at this moment? We need a decision now.

The Player as The Prime Example

And for numerous reasons, Sesko feels like Patient Zero in this respect, a player inextricably trapped between football's two countervailing, unavoidable forces. The need to delay final conclusions, to let technical development and strategic understanding to develop. And the imperative to generate instant verdicts, a conveyor belt of takes and jokes, out-of-context condemnations and pointless contrasts, a puzzle that can never truly be circled.

I do not propose to provide a substantive analysis of Sesko's time at United so far. He has started on four occasions in the top flight in a highly unpredictable team, found the net twice, and had a grand total of 116 contacts with the ball. What exactly are we analysing? Nor do I propose to replicate Gary Neville's and Ian Wright's seminal masterwork "The Sesko Debate", in which two famous analysts argue thrillingly on a popular show over whether he needs ten strikes to be a success this year (one pundit), or whether it's really more like twelve or thirteen (Wright).

A Harsh Reality

For all this I enjoyed watching Sesko at his former club: a big, screeching sports car of a forward, playing in a team ideally suited to his abilities: given the license to rampage but also the freedom to miss. Partly this is why United feels like the cruellest place he could possibly be at the moment: a place where "harsh judgments" are summarily issued in about the time it takes to watch a pre-roll ad, the club with the widest and most pitiless gulf between the time and air he needs, and the opportunity he is likely to receive.

There was a case of this over the international break, when a viral chart conveniently informed us that the player had been judged – by a wide margin – the worst signing of the summer transfer window by a poll of football representatives. And of course, the media are not alone in this. Club channels, online personalities, anonymous X accounts with a oddly high number of pornbot followers: all parties with a vested interest is now essentially aligned along the same principles, an environment deliberately nosed towards controversy.

The Psychological Toll

Endless scrolling and tapping. What are we doing to ourselves? Are we aware, on any level, what this endless stream of aggravation is doing to our brains? Separate from the inherent strangeness of playing in the center of this, knowing on some surreal chain-reaction level that every single thing about players is now essentially material, commodity, open-source property to be packaged and traded.

And yes, in part this is because it's Manchester United, the corpse that continues to feed the narrative, a big club that must always be generating the big feelings. However, partly this is a seasonal affliction, a pendulum of opinion most visibly and harshly observed at this time of year, roughly four weeks after the window has closed. Throughout the summer we have been desiring footballers, praising them, drooling over them. Yet, just a few weeks in, a lot of those very players are now being disdained as broken goods. Is it time to worry about Jamie Gittens? Was Arsenal's purchase of Viktor Gyökeres wise? What was the purpose of Randal Kolo Muani?

A Wider Issue

It seems fitting that Sesko meets Liverpool on Sunday: a team simultaneously 13 months unbeaten at their stadium in the Premier League and yet in their own situation of perceived turmoil, like submitting a a report on someone who went to the store 30 minutes ago. Defensively suspect. Mohamed Salah finished. The striker an expensive flop. Arne Slot bald.

Maybe we have not yet quite grasped the way the storyline of football has started to replace football the actual game, to influence the way we watch it, an entire sport reoriented around talking points and reaction, something that occurs in the backdrop while we scroll through our phones, incapable to detach from the saline drip of opinions and further hot takes. Perhaps this player taking the hit right now. However, everyone is sacrificing a part of the experience here.