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Picture this: a happy Rasmus Højlund in a Napoli shirt. Now, place that with a dejected Benjamin Sesko in a Manchester United kit, appearing like he's missed a sitter. Don't worry locating an actual photo of that miss; context is your adversary. Now, add some goal stats in a big, silly font. Don't forget the emojis. Post the image across all platforms.

Would you point out that Højlund's tally features scores in the premier European competition while Sesko does not compete in continental tournaments? Certainly not. And would you highlight that several of Højlund's goals came against Belarus and Greece, or that his national team is much stronger to Slovenia and generates many more chances. You manage online for a major brand, pure engagement is your livelihood, Manchester United are the biggest draw, and nuance is your sworn enemy.

Thus the cycle of online material spins. Your next task is to scan a 44-minute podcast with the legendary goalkeeper and find the part where he calls the acquisition of Sesko "weird". There's a bit, where he prefaces his comments by saying, "Nothing negative to say about Benjamin Sesko"... well, remove that part. Nobody wants that. Just make sure "weird" and "the player" appear together in the headline. People will be furious.

This Time of Promise and Premature Judgment

The heart of fall has traditionally one of my favourite times to watch football. Leaves fall, winds shift, squads and strategies are still fresh, everything is new and yet patterns are emerging. Key players of the season ahead are staking their claims. The summer market is shut. Nobody is talking about the multiple trophies yet. Everyone are in contention. At this precise point, anything is possible.

Yet, for similar reasons, mid-autumn has long been one of my least favourite times to consume news on football. For while 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 best player in the league at this moment? We need a decision immediately.

Sesko as The Prime Example

In many ways, Benjamin Sesko feels like Patient Zero in this respect, a player inextricably trapped between football's opposing, non-negotiable forces. The imperative to withhold definitive judgment, allowing technical development and tactical sophistication to mature. And the imperative to produce permanent verdicts, a conveyor belt of opinions and jokes, out-of-context criticisms and pointless contrasts, a puzzle that can never truly be solved.

It is not my aim to provide a in-depth evaluation of Sesko's stint at Manchester United so far. He has been in the lineup four times in the top flight in a wildly inconsistent team, found the net twice, and taken a mere of 116 touches. What precisely are we evaluating? And will I attempt to replicate the pundits' notable debate "Argument Over Benjamin Sesko", in which two of England's leading pundits duel thrillingly on a podcast over whether Sesko needs 10 goals to be a success this year (one pundit), or whether it is more like twelve or thirteen (the other).

A Harsh Reality

For all this I loved watching Sesko at Leipzig: a big, screeching sports car of a striker, playing in a team pitched perfectly to his abilities: given the freedom to rampage but also the freedom to fail. And in part this is why Manchester United feels like the cruellest place he could possibly be at the moment: a place where "harsh judgments" are summarily issued in roughly the duration it takes to load a short advertisement, the club with the widest and most ruthless gap between the patience and space he requires, and the time and air he is likely to receive.

There was a case of this during the international break, when a viral infographic handily stated that the player had been judged – decisively – the poorest acquisition of the summer transfer window by a survey of football representatives. Naturally, the media are not the only ones in this. Team social media, influencers, anonymous X accounts with a oddly high number of fake followers: everybody with a vested interest is now essentially aligned along the identical rules, an ecosystem explicitly geared for provocation.

The Mental Cost

Endless scrolling and tapping. What is happening to ourselves? Are we aware, on some level, what this endless stream of irritation is doing to our minds? Separate from the inherent strangeness of being a player in the center of it all, knowing on a bizarre chain-reaction level that every single thing about them is now basically material, commodity, open-source property to be repackaged and traded.

Indeed, partly this is because it's Manchester United, the corpse that keeps nourishing the cycle, a major institution that must constantly be generating the strong emotions. But also, partly this is a temporary malaise, a pendulum of judgment most visibly and cruelly glimpsed at this season, about a month after the transfer market shut. Throughout the summer we have been coveting footballers, eulogising them, salivating over them. Yet, just a few weeks in, a lot of those same players are now being disdained as broken goods. Is it time to worry about a new signing? Was Arsenal's purchase of Viktor Gyökeres wise? What was the point of another expensive buy?

The Bigger Picture

It seems fitting that he meets Liverpool on Sunday: a team at once 13 months unbeaten at home in the Premier League and yet in their own state of perceived turmoil, like submitting a missing person’s report on a person who went to the shops half an hour ago. Too open. Mohamed Salah past his prime. The striker an expensive flop. Arne Slot bald.

Maybe we have not yet quite grasped the way the storyline of football has begun to supplant football the actual game, to inflect the way we watch it, an entire sport repivoted around discussion topics and reaction, an activity that happens in the background while we scroll through our devices, unable to disconnect from the constant flow of opinions and further hot takes. Perhaps Sesko taking the hit right now. However, everyone is sacrificing a part of the experience in this process.