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Picture this: a smiling Rasmus Højlund in a Napoli shirt. Now, place that with a dejected Benjamin Sesko sporting United's jersey, appearing like he just missed a sitter. Do not worry finding an actual photo of that miss; background information is your adversary. Now, include some goal stats in a big, comical font. Remember some emoticons. Post the image across all platforms.

Would you mention that Højlund's tally features strikes in the Champions League while his counterpart does not compete in continental tournaments? Of course not. And will you highlight that several of Højlund's goals came against weaker national sides, or that Denmark is far superior to Slovenia and generates many more chances. If you manage social media for a major brand, raw engagement is your livelihood, Manchester United are the prime target, and nuance is your sworn enemy.

Thus the cycle of online material turns. Your next task is to scan a lengthy podcast featuring Peter Schmeichel and find the part where he calls the signing of Sesko "strange". There's a bit, where he qualifies his comments by saying, "Nothing negative to say about Benjamin Sesko"... well, remove that part. No one wants that. Simply make sure "weird" and "the player" are paired in the headline. The audience will be outraged.

This Time of Promise and Premature Judgment

Mid-autumn has long been one of my favourite times to observe football. Leaves fall, winds shift, the teams and tactics are still fresh, everything is new and yet patterns are emerging. The stars of the season ahead are planting their flags. The summer market is closed. No one is talking about the multiple trophies yet. All teams are in contention. Right now, anything is possible.

However, for similar reasons, this period has also been one of my least favourite times to read about football. Because although no outcomes are decided, opinions must be formed immediately. Jack Grealish is reborn. The German talent has been a crushing disappointment. Could Semenyo be the best player in the league right now? We need a decision immediately.

The Player as Patient Zero

And for numerous reasons, Sesko feels like the archetype in this context, a player caught between football's two countervailing, unavoidable forces. The imperative to withhold final conclusions, to let technical development and strategic understanding to mature. And the demand to produce instant definitive judgment, a conveyor belt of opinions and jokes, context-free condemnations and meaningless contrasts, a puzzle that can not truly be circled.

It is not my aim to offer a substantive analysis of Sesko's stint at United so far. He has started four times in the top flight in a highly unpredictable team, found the net twice, and had a mere of 116 touches. What precisely are we analysing? Nor will I attempt to duplicate the pundits' notable debate "Argument Over Benjamin Sesko", in which two famous analysts argue thrillingly on a podcast over whether he needs ten strikes to be a success this season (one pundit), or whether it's really more like twelve or thirteen (Wright).

A Harsh Reality

For all this I loved watching Sesko at Leipzig: a powerful, fast sports car of a striker, playing in a team pitched perfectly to his abilities: afforded the license to attack but also the freedom to fail. Partly this is why United feels like the most unforgiving place he could possibly be at the moment: a place where "harsh judgments" are summarily issued in about the time it takes to load a short advertisement, the club with the widest and most ruthless gap between the time and air he requires, and the time and air he is going to get.

There was a case of this during the national team pause, when a viral infographic handily stated that the player had been deemed – decisively – the worst signing of the summer transfer window by a survey of football representatives. Naturally, the press are not the only ones in this. Club channels, online personalities, anonymous X accounts with a suspiciously high number of fake followers: all parties with a vested interest is now essentially aligned along the same principles, an ecosystem deliberately geared for controversy.

The Psychological Toll

Endless scrolling and tapping. What are we doing to us? Are we aware, on any level, what this infinite stream of irritation is doing to our brains? Quite apart from the essential weirdness of playing in the center of this, aware on some surreal butterfly-effect level that each aspect about them is now basically content, commodity, public property to be packaged and exchanged.

And yes, in part this is because it's Manchester United, the entity that keeps nourishing the cycle, a major institution that must always be generating the strong emotions. However, in part this is a temporary malaise, a pendulum of judgment most visibly and cruelly observed at this time of year, roughly four weeks after the transfer market shut. Throughout the summer we have been coveting footballers, eulogising them, drooling over them. Yet, just a few weeks in, many of those very players are now being disdained as broken goods. Is it time to be concerned about Jamie Gittens? Was Arsenal's purchase of their striker necessary? What was the point of another expensive buy?

The Bigger Picture

It feels appropriate that he faces Liverpool on the weekend: a team at once on a long unbeaten run at their stadium in the league and somehow in their own state of perceived turmoil, like submitting a a report on someone who popped to the store half an hour ago. Too open. Mohamed Salah finished. The striker an expensive flop. Arne Slot bald.

Perhaps we have not yet quite grasped the way the narrative of football has begun to supplant football the actual game, to inflect the way we view it, an whole competition repivoted around discussion topics and immediate responses, something that happens in the background while we browse through our devices, unable to disconnect from the saline drip of opinions and further hot takes. Perhaps Sesko bearing the brunt at present. But in a way, everyone is losing a part of the experience here.