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Picture this: a happy the Danish striker wearing Napoli's colors. Now, place it with a sad-looking the Slovenian forward in a Manchester United kit, looking as if he's missed a sitter. Do not worry finding an actual photo of that miss; background information is your adversary. Then, add some goal stats in a large, silly font. Don't forget some emoticons. Post it across all platforms.

Would you mention that Højlund's tally includes scores in the Champions League while his counterpart does not compete in continental tournaments? Of course not. Nor would you note that several of Højlund's goals were scored versus weaker national sides, or that his national team is far superior to Sesko's Slovenia and generates far more scoring opportunities. You manage social media for a large outlet, pure engagement is your livelihood, United are the prime target, and context is your sworn enemy.

Thus the cycle of online material spins. Your next task is to sift through a lengthy podcast with Peter Schmeichel and extract the part where he describes the signing of Sesko "weird". Just before, where Schmeichel prefaces his remarks by saying, "I have nothing bad to say about Benjamin Sesko"... well, cut that. Nobody wants that. Just make sure "weird" and "the player" are paired in the title. The audience will be outraged.

This Time of Potential and Hasty Opinions

The heart of fall has long been one of my favourite times to watch football. The leaves swirl, winds shift, squads and strategies are still fresh, everything is new and yet everything is beginning to form. Key players of the season ahead are staking their claims. The transfer window is shut. Nobody is mentioning the quadruple yet. Everyone are in contention. At this precise point, anything is possible.

However, for similar reasons, this period has also been one of my least favourite times to read about football. For while no outcomes are decided, opinions must be formed immediately. The City winger is reborn. The German talent has been a crushing disappointment. Is Antoine Semenyo the best player in the league right now? Please a decision now.

Sesko as The Prime Example

In many ways, Sesko feels like Patient Zero in this context, a player caught between football's opposing, unavoidable forces. The imperative to delay final conclusions, to let layers of technical texture and tactical sophistication to develop. And the demand to produce permanent verdicts, a conveyor belt of takes and memes, context-free condemnations and pointless comparisons, a square that can never truly be solved.

I do not propose to provide a in-depth analysis of Sesko's stint at United so far. He has been in the lineup on four occasions in the top flight in a highly unpredictable team, found the net twice, and taken a grand total of 116 contacts with the ball. What exactly are we evaluating? Nor will I attempt to replicate the pundits' notable debate "Argument Over Benjamin Sesko", in which two of England's leading pundits duel passionately on a popular show over whether Sesko needs 10 goals to be a success this season (one pundit), or whether it's really more like twelve or thirteen (Wright).

A Harsh Reality

Despite this I loved watching Sesko at his former club: a powerful, fast racing car of a forward, playing in a team pitched perfectly to his talents: afforded the freedom to rampage but also the freedom to fail. And in part this is why United feels like the cruellest place he could possibly be right now: a place where "brutal verdicts" are summarily issued in roughly the duration it takes to load a pre-roll ad, the club with the largest and most pitiless gulf between the patience and space he needs, and the time and air he is going to get.

There was a case of this over the international break, when a widely shared chart conveniently informed us that the player had been judged – decisively – the poorest acquisition of the summer transfer window by a poll of football representatives. And of course, the media are by no means the only ones in such behavior. Team social media, influencers, unidentified profiles with a oddly high number of pornbot followers: all parties with a vested interest is now essentially operating along the same principles, an environment deliberately nosed towards controversy.

The Psychological Toll

Scroll, scroll, tap, scroll. What are we doing to ourselves? Are we aware, on any level, what this endless sluice of irritation is doing to our brains? Quite apart from the essential weirdness of playing in the middle of it all, aware on some surreal chain-reaction level that every single thing about them is now basically material, commodity, open-source property to be repackaged and traded.

And yes, in part this is because it's Manchester United, the corpse that keeps nourishing the narrative, a major institution that must always be generating the strong emotions. However, partly this is a temporary malaise, a swing of opinion most clearly and harshly observed at this time of year, roughly four weeks after the window has closed. Throughout the summer we have been desiring players, praising them, salivating over them. Now, only a handful of games later, a lot of those very players are already being disdained as broken goods. Is it time to be concerned about a new signing? Did Arsenal actually need their striker wise? What was the point of another expensive buy?

A Wider Issue

It seems fitting that Sesko meets Liverpool on Sunday: a team simultaneously 13 months unbeaten at their stadium in the league and yet in their own state of perceived turmoil, like submitting a a report on a person who popped to the shops 30 minutes ago. Defensively suspect. Their star finished. Alexander Isak waste of money. Arne Slot losing his hair.

Maybe we have failed to understand the way the storyline of football has started to replace football itself, to influence the way we watch it, an entire sport repivoted around discussion topics and reaction, something that occurs in the background while we scroll through our devices, unable to disconnect from the saline drip of opinions and more takes. It may be Sesko taking the hit at present. But in a way, we're all losing a part of the experience in this process.