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Imagine the following: a happy the Danish striker in a Napoli shirt. Next, juxtapose that with a sad-looking the Slovenian forward in a Manchester United kit, appearing like he just missed an open goal. Do not bother locating an actual photo of him missing; background information is the enemy. Then, add statistics in a big, comical font. Remember some emoticons. Post it across all platforms.

Will you point out that Højlund's goal count features scores in the premier European competition while his counterpart isn't playing in Europe? Certainly not. Nor will you highlight that several of Højlund's goals were scored versus weaker national sides, or that Denmark is much stronger to Slovenia and creates far more chances. If you run social media for a large outlet, raw interaction is your livelihood, Manchester United are the biggest draw, and context is your sworn enemy.

So the cycle of content spins. Your next task is to sift through a 44-minute interview featuring Peter Schmeichel and find the part where he calls the acquisition of Sesko "weird". There's a bit, where he prefaces his remarks by saying, "Nothing negative to say about Benjamin Sesko"... yes, remove that part. No one wants that. Simply make sure "weird" and "Sesko" are paired in the title. People will be furious.

This Time of Promise and Premature Judgment

Mid-autumn has long been one of my preferred times to watch football. The leaves swirl, the wind turns, squads and strategies are newly formed, everything is new and yet everything is beginning to form. The stars of the season ahead are staking their claims. The transfer window is closed. No one is mentioning the multiple trophies yet. Everyone are in contention. Right now, all is possibility.

Yet, for many of the same reasons, this period has long been one of my least favourite times to read about football. Because although nothing has yet been settled, something must always be getting settled. The City winger is reborn. Florian Wirtz has been a major letdown. Is Antoine Semenyo the best player in the league right now? We need a decision now.

Sesko as The Prime Example

In many ways, Sesko feels like Patient Zero in this respect, a player inextricably trapped between football's opposing, unavoidable forces. The imperative to delay final conclusions, allowing layers of technical texture and tactical sophistication to mature. And the demand to generate instant definitive judgment, a constant stream of takes and jokes, context-free criticisms and meaningless contrasts, a puzzle that can never truly be solved.

It is not my aim to provide a substantive analysis of Sesko's stint at Manchester United so far. The guy has started four times in the Premier League in a highly unpredictable team, scored two goals, and had a mere of 116 contacts with the ball. What precisely are we evaluating? Nor do I propose to duplicate the pundits' seminal masterwork "The Sesko Debate", in which two of England's leading pundits duel passionately on a popular show over whether Sesko needs 10 goals to be a success this season (Neville), or whether it's really more like 12 or 13 (Wright).

A Harsh Reality

Despite this I enjoyed watching Sesko at his former club: a big, fast sports car of a striker, playing in a team ideally suited to his abilities: afforded the freedom to attack but also the leeway to miss. Partly this is why United feels like the most unforgiving place he could possibly be right now: a place where "harsh judgments" are handed down in roughly the duration it takes to load a pre-roll ad, the club with the largest and most pitiless gap between the patience and space he needs, and the opportunity he is likely to receive.

There was an example of this over the international break, when a widely shared chart conveniently informed us that Sesko had been deemed – decisively – the worst signing of the recent market by a poll of 20 agents. Naturally, the press are by no means the only ones in this. Club channels, influencers, anonymous X accounts with a suspiciously high number of pornbot followers: all parties with a vested interest is now essentially aligned along the same principles, an environment deliberately nosed towards provocation.

The Psychological Toll

Endless scrolling and tapping. What are we doing to us? Are we aware, on some level, what this endless sluice of irritation is doing to our brains? Separate from the essential weirdness of being a player in the middle of this, aware on some surreal butterfly-effect level that every single thing about them is now essentially content, product, public property to be packaged and traded.

Indeed, in part this is because United are United, the entity that keeps nourishing the narrative, a big club that must constantly be producing the strong emotions. But also, partly this is a temporary malaise, a swing of opinion most visibly and cruelly observed at this season, roughly four weeks after the window has closed. Throughout the summer we have been coveting players, praising them, salivating over them. Yet, only a handful of games later, a lot of those very players are already being disdained as broken goods. Should we start to be concerned about a new signing? Did Arsenal actually need Viktor Gyökeres necessary? What was the point of another expensive buy?

The Bigger Picture

It seems fitting that Sesko faces their rivals on Sunday: a team simultaneously on a long unbeaten run at home in the league and yet in their own situation of perceived turmoil, like filing a a report on a person who popped to the store half an hour ago. Defensively suspect. Mohamed Salah past his prime. Alexander Isak waste of money. Arne Slot losing his hair.

Maybe we have failed to understand the way the narrative of football has started to replace football itself, to inflect the way we watch it, an whole competition repivoted around discussion topics and immediate responses, an activity that happens in the backdrop while we scroll through our devices, unable to disconnect from the saline drip of takes and more takes. It may be Sesko bearing the brunt right now. But in a way, everyone is losing a part of the experience here.