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Picture the following: a happy the Danish striker in a Napoli shirt. Now, place it with a dejected the Slovenian forward in a Manchester United kit, appearing like he just missed an open goal. Don't worry finding an actual photo of that miss; background information is the enemy. Now, include statistics in a big, silly font. Remember the emojis. Share it across all platforms.

Would you point out that Højlund's goal count features scores in the premier European competition while his counterpart isn't playing in continental tournaments? Certainly not. Nor would you note that four of Højlund's goals came against Belarus and Greece, or that Denmark is much stronger to Sesko's Slovenia and creates many more scoring opportunities. You manage social media for a major brand, pure engagement is your livelihood, United are the biggest draw, and nuance is your sworn enemy.

Thus the cycle of online material turns. The next job is to sift through a lengthy podcast featuring the legendary goalkeeper and extract the part where he describes the acquisition of Sesko "strange". Just before, where Schmeichel prefaces his comments by saying, "Nothing negative to say about Benjamin Sesko"... well, remove that part. No one wants that. Just ensure "strange" and "Sesko" appear together in the title. The audience will be outraged.

This Time of Potential and Premature Judgment

The heart of fall has long been one of my preferred periods to watch football. Leaves fall, winds shift, the teams and tactics are still fresh, everything is new and yet everything is beginning to form. The stars of the season ahead are planting their flags. The transfer window is shut. Nobody is talking about the quadruple yet. All teams are still in the game. Right now, all is possibility.

Yet, for similar reasons, mid-autumn has long been one of my least favourite times to read about football. For while nothing has yet been settled, something must always be getting settled. The City winger is resurgent. The German talent has been a crushing disappointment. Is Antoine Semenyo the best player in the league at this moment? Please an answer immediately.

Sesko as The Prime Example

In many ways, Sesko feels like the archetype in this context, a player inextricably trapped between football's opposing, non-negotiable forces. The need to withhold definitive judgment, allowing layers of technical texture and tactical sophistication to develop. And the demand to produce instant definitive judgment, a conveyor belt of takes and jokes, out-of-context criticisms and pointless contrasts, a square that can not truly be solved.

I do not propose to provide a in-depth analysis of Sesko's stint at United to date. The guy has started four times in the Premier League in a wildly inconsistent team, found the net twice, and had a grand total of 116 touches. What exactly are we analysing? And do I propose to replicate Gary Neville's and Ian Wright's seminal masterwork "Argument Over Benjamin Sesko", in which two of England's leading pundits argue thrillingly on a popular show over whether he needs ten strikes to be deemed successful this season (one pundit), or whether it is more like twelve or thirteen (Wright).

A Harsh Reality

Despite this I enjoyed watching Sesko at his former club: a big, screeching racing car of a striker, playing in a team ideally suited to his abilities: given the license to attack but also the leeway to miss. Partly this is why United feels like the cruellest place he could possibly be right now: a place where "harsh judgments" are handed down in about the time it takes to load a pre-roll ad, the club with the widest and most ruthless gap between the time and air he needs, and the time and air he is going to get.

There was an example of this over the international break, when a widely shared chart handily stated that the player had been judged – by a wide margin – the worst signing of the recent market by a survey of football representatives. Naturally, the media are not the only ones in such behavior. Team social media, online personalities, anonymous X accounts with a suspiciously high number of pornbot followers: all parties with a vested interest is now basically aligned along the same principles, an environment deliberately nosed towards controversy.

The Mental Cost

Scroll, scroll, tap, scroll. What is happening to ourselves? Are we aware, on any level, what this endless stream of aggravation is doing to our minds? Quite apart from the inherent strangeness of being a player in the middle 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 exchanged.

And yes, partly this is because United are United, the entity that continues to feed the cycle, a big club that must constantly be generating the strong emotions. But also, in part this is a seasonal affliction, a swing of opinion most clearly and cruelly glimpsed at this season, roughly four weeks after the window has closed. Throughout the summer we have been coveting players, eulogising them, salivating over them. Yet, just a few weeks in, many of those same players are already being disdained as failures. Is it time to be concerned about a new signing? Was Arsenal's purchase of their striker wise? What was the purpose of Randal Kolo Muani?

A Wider Issue

It seems fitting that he meets their rivals on Sunday: a team simultaneously on a long unbeaten run at home in the Premier League and yet in their own situation of feverish crisis, like submitting a missing person’s report on a person who popped to the shops 30 minutes ago. Defensively suspect. Their star finished. The striker an expensive flop. The coach losing his hair.

Maybe we have failed to understand the way the storyline of football has started to replace football the actual game, to inflect the way we watch it, an entire sport reoriented around talking points and reaction, an activity that happens in the backdrop while we scroll through our devices, unable to disconnect from the saline drip of opinions and more takes. Perhaps Sesko bearing the brunt right now. However, we're all losing a part of the experience here.