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Picture this: a smiling the Danish striker wearing Napoli's colors. Now, place that with a dejected the Slovenian forward in a Manchester United kit, appearing like he's missed an open goal. Don't worry finding a real picture of that miss; context is your adversary. Then, add statistics in a large, silly font. Remember the emojis. Post it everywhere.

Would you mention that Højlund's goal count includes scores in the premier European competition while Sesko does not compete in continental tournaments? Certainly not. Nor will you note that four of Højlund's goals came against weaker national sides, or that Denmark is far superior to Sesko's Slovenia and creates far more chances. You manage social media for a large outlet, pure engagement is what pays the bills, United are the biggest draw, and context is your sworn enemy.

Thus the wheel of content turns. Your next task is to sift through a lengthy podcast featuring Peter Schmeichel and extract 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"... yes, remove that part. No one wants that. Simply ensure "weird" and "the player" are paired in the title. People will be furious.

The Season of Potential and Hasty Opinions

The heart of fall has traditionally one of my favourite times to watch football. The leaves swirl, the wind turns, squads and strategies are still fresh, everything is new and yet patterns are emerging. Key players of the season ahead are planting their flags. The transfer window is shut. No one is talking about the multiple trophies yet. All teams are still in the game. At this precise point, all is possibility.

However, for similar reasons, mid-autumn has also been one of my least favourite times to consume news on football. Because although nothing has yet been settled, opinions must be formed immediately. The City winger is resurgent. The German talent has been a major letdown. Could Semenyo be the best player in the league right now? We need an answer now.

The Player as The Prime Example

In many ways, Sesko feels like the archetype in this context, a player caught between football's two countervailing, non-negotiable forces. The need to withhold definitive judgment, allowing technical development and strategic understanding to develop. And the demand to produce instant definitive judgment, a constant stream of takes and jokes, out-of-context criticisms and meaningless contrasts, a square that can never truly be solved.

I do not propose to provide a in-depth evaluation of Sesko's stint at Manchester United so far. He has started four times in the Premier League in a highly unpredictable team, found the net twice, and taken a mere of 116 contacts with the ball. What precisely are we analysing? Nor do I propose to replicate Gary Neville's and Ian Wright's notable debate "The Sesko Debate", in which two famous analysts duel passionately on a podcast over whether Sesko needs 10 goals to be a success this year (Neville), or whether it's really more like 12 or 13 (the other).

A Cruel Environment

Despite this I loved watching him at Leipzig: a powerful, screeching racing car of a striker, playing in a team pitched perfectly to his abilities: given the license to rampage but also the freedom to miss. And in part this is why United feels like the most unforgiving place he could possibly be right now: a place where "harsh judgments" are summarily issued in roughly the duration it takes to watch a pre-roll ad, the club with the widest and most ruthless gap between the time and air he needs, and the opportunity he is likely to receive.

We saw an example of this over the international break, when a widely shared infographic handily informed us that the player had been deemed – decisively – the worst signing of the summer transfer window by a poll of football representatives. Naturally, the press are by no means the only ones in such behavior. Team social media, online personalities, anonymous X accounts with a oddly high number of pornbot followers: everybody with skin in the game is now basically operating along the same principles, an ecosystem deliberately nosed towards provocation.

The Psychological Toll

Scroll, scroll, tap, scroll. What are we doing to us? Do we realize, on any level, what this endless stream of irritation is doing to our minds? Separate from the inherent strangeness of being a player in the middle of this, aware on a bizarre chain-reaction level that each aspect about players is now basically content, commodity, public property to be repackaged and traded.

And yes, in part this is because United are United, the entity that continues to feed the narrative, a big club that must always be producing the big feelings. But also, partly this is a temporary malaise, a pendulum of opinion most clearly and harshly glimpsed at this season, about a month after the window has closed. All summer long we have been coveting footballers, praising them, drooling over them. Now, just a few weeks in, many of those very players are already being dismissed as broken goods. Should we start to be concerned about Jamie Gittens? Was Arsenal's purchase of their striker wise? What was the point of Randal Kolo Muani?

A Wider Issue

It feels appropriate that he faces their rivals on Sunday: a team simultaneously on a long unbeaten run at their stadium in the league and yet in their own situation of feverish crisis, like filing a missing person’s report on a person who popped to the store half an hour ago. Too open. Mohamed Salah past his prime. The striker an expensive flop. The coach losing his hair.

Perhaps we have failed to understand the way the storyline of football has started to replace football itself, to inflect the way we watch it, an whole competition reoriented around discussion topics and reaction, an activity that happens in the background while we browse through our phones, incapable to detach from the constant flow of opinions and more takes. It may be Sesko taking the hit right now. But in a way, we're all sacrificing something here.