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Imagine this: a smiling Rasmus Højlund wearing Napoli's colors. Next, place that with a sad-looking the Slovenian forward sporting United's jersey, appearing like he's missed an open goal. Do not bother finding an actual photo of him missing; context is your adversary. Then, add statistics in a big, silly font. Remember some emoticons. Share it everywhere.

Will you mention that Højlund's goal count features scores in the Champions League while Sesko does not compete in continental tournaments? Certainly not. And will you note that several of the Dane's goals were scored versus Belarus and Greece, or that Denmark is much stronger to Slovenia and creates far more chances. You run online for a major brand, pure engagement is what pays the bills, Manchester United are the biggest draw, and context is your sworn enemy.

Thus the cycle of online material turns. Your next task is to sift through a 44-minute podcast featuring the legendary goalkeeper and extract the part where he calls the acquisition of Sesko "strange". Just before, where he qualifies his comments by saying, "Nothing negative to say about Benjamin Sesko"... well, cut that. No one wants that. Simply make sure "strange" and "the player" appear together in the title. The audience will be furious.

This Time of Potential and Premature Judgment

Mid-autumn has traditionally one of my favourite times to watch football. Leaves fall, the wind turns, squads and strategies are newly formed, all is novel and yet patterns are emerging. The stars of the coming months are staking their claims. The transfer window is closed. No one is talking about the quadruple yet. All teams are in contention. At this precise point, all is possibility.

However, for similar reasons, mid-autumn has long been one of my most disliked times to read about football. Because although no outcomes are decided, opinions must be formed immediately. Jack Grealish is resurgent. The German talent has been a crushing disappointment. Could Semenyo be the top performer in the league right now? Please an answer immediately.

The Player as The Prime Example

And for numerous reasons, Sesko feels like the archetype in this respect, a player inextricably trapped between football's opposing, unavoidable forces. The imperative to withhold final conclusions, to let technical development and strategic understanding to develop. And the demand to produce instant verdicts, a constant stream of opinions and jokes, context-free criticisms and pointless comparisons, a square that can never truly be circled.

I do not propose to offer a substantive evaluation of Sesko's time at United to date. He has been in the lineup on four occasions in the top flight in a wildly inconsistent team, scored two goals, and had a mere of 116 contacts with the ball. What exactly are we analysing? Nor will I attempt to duplicate the pundits' seminal masterwork "The Sesko Debate", in which two famous analysts duel passionately on a popular show over whether Sesko needs ten strikes to be a success this season (one pundit), or whether it's really more like twelve or thirteen (the other).

A Cruel Environment

For all this I loved watching Sesko at his former club: a powerful, fast sports car of a striker, playing in a team ideally suited to his talents: afforded the freedom to rampage but also the leeway to miss. And in part this is why Manchester United feels like the most unforgiving place he could possibly be right now: a place where "brutal verdicts" are summarily issued in roughly the duration it takes to watch a short advertisement, the club with the largest and most pitiless gulf between the time and air he requires, and the opportunity he is going to get.

There was a case of this during the national team pause, when a viral chart handily stated that the player had been deemed – decisively – the poorest acquisition of the recent market by a poll of football representatives. Naturally, the press are not the only ones in such behavior. Team social media, influencers, anonymous X accounts with a oddly high number of pornbot followers: everybody with a vested interest is now essentially operating along the same principles, an environment deliberately nosed towards provocation.

The Mental Cost

Scroll, scroll, tap, scroll. What is happening to ourselves? Do we realize, on any level, what this infinite sluice of aggravation is doing to our minds? Separate from the inherent strangeness of being a player in the middle of it all, knowing on a bizarre butterfly-effect level that each aspect about players is now essentially material, product, public property to be packaged and exchanged.

And yes, in part this is because it's Manchester United, the corpse that keeps nourishing the cycle, a big club that must always be producing the strong emotions. But also, in part this is a seasonal affliction, a pendulum of opinion most clearly and harshly observed at this season, about a month after the window has closed. Throughout the summer we have been desiring footballers, eulogising them, salivating over them. Yet, only a handful of games later, a lot of those very players are already being dismissed as failures. Should we start to worry about Jamie Gittens? Was Arsenal's purchase of their striker wise? What was the purpose of Randal Kolo Muani?

The Bigger Picture

It feels appropriate that Sesko meets Liverpool on Sunday: a team at once on a long unbeaten run at home in the Premier League and yet in their own situation of feverish crisis, like submitting a a report on someone who went to the store half an hour ago. Too open. Mohamed Salah finished. The striker waste of money. Arne Slot losing his hair.

Maybe we have not yet quite grasped the way the narrative of football has started to replace football the actual game, to influence the way we view it, an entire sport reoriented around discussion topics and reaction, something that happens in the background while we scroll through our phones, incapable to detach from the saline drip of takes and further hot takes. Perhaps this player taking the hit at present. But in a way, we're all sacrificing a part of the experience in this process.