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Imagine the following: a happy the Danish striker wearing Napoli's colors. Now, juxtapose it with a dejected Benjamin Sesko sporting United's jersey, appearing like he just missed a sitter. Don't worry locating an actual photo of that miss; background information is the enemy. Then, include some goal stats in a large, comical font. Don't forget the emojis. Post it everywhere.

Would you mention that Højlund's goal count features strikes in the premier European competition while Sesko isn't playing in continental tournaments? Of course not. And will you highlight 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 creates far more chances. If you manage social media for a large outlet, pure engagement is what pays the bills, Manchester United are the biggest draw, and context is your sworn enemy.

So the cycle of content spins. The next job is to sift through a 44-minute interview featuring the legendary goalkeeper and find the part where he describes the signing of Sesko "weird". Just before, where he qualifies his comments by saying, "I have nothing bad to say about Benjamin Sesko"... well, cut that. Nobody wants that. Simply make sure "weird" and "the player" appear together in the title. People will be outraged.

This Time of Potential and Hasty Opinions

The heart of fall has traditionally one of my favourite periods to watch football. Leaves fall, the wind turns, the teams and tactics are newly formed, all is novel and yet patterns are emerging. Key players of the coming months are staking their claims. The transfer window is shut. Nobody is talking about the multiple trophies yet. Everyone are in contention. At this precise point, all is possibility.

Yet, for similar reasons, this period has long been one of my most disliked times to consume news on football. Because although no outcomes are decided, something must always be getting settled. Jack Grealish is reborn. The German talent has been a major letdown. Could Semenyo be the top performer in the league right now? Please a decision immediately.

Sesko as The Prime Example

And for numerous reasons, Benjamin Sesko feels like Patient Zero in this respect, a player inextricably trapped between football's two countervailing, non-negotiable forces. The need to withhold definitive judgment, to let layers of technical texture and strategic understanding to develop. And the demand to produce instant definitive judgment, a constant stream of takes and jokes, context-free condemnations and pointless contrasts, a puzzle that can not truly be solved.

It is not my aim to provide a in-depth evaluation of Sesko's time at United to date. He has started four times in the top flight in a highly unpredictable team, found the net twice, and had a grand total of 116 contacts with the ball. What exactly are we evaluating? Nor will I attempt to duplicate the pundits' notable debate "Argument Over Benjamin Sesko", in which two of England's leading pundits argue thrillingly on a podcast over whether Sesko needs ten strikes to be deemed successful this season (one pundit), or whether it's really more like twelve or thirteen (the other).

A Harsh Reality

Despite this I enjoyed watching him at his former club: a big, screeching racing car of a forward, playing in a team ideally suited to his talents: given the license to attack but also the freedom to miss. And in part this is why United feels like the most unforgiving place he could possibly be at the moment: a place where "brutal verdicts" 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 patience and space he requires, and the opportunity he is going to get.

There was a case of this over the national team pause, when a viral chart handily stated that the player had been deemed – decisively – the worst signing of the recent market by a survey of 20 agents. And of course, the media are not the only ones in this. Team social media, influencers, unidentified profiles with a suspiciously high number of fake followers: everybody with a vested interest is now basically aligned along the same principles, an environment explicitly nosed towards controversy.

The Mental Cost

Endless scrolling and tapping. What is happening to ourselves? Are we aware, on any level, what this infinite sluice of aggravation is doing to our brains? Separate from the inherent strangeness of being a player in the center of this, knowing on a bizarre chain-reaction level that each aspect about players is now basically content, product, open-source property to be repackaged and traded.

Indeed, partly this is because it's Manchester United, the entity that continues to feed the narrative, a major institution that must always be generating the strong emotions. However, partly this is a seasonal affliction, a swing of opinion most visibly and cruelly glimpsed at this season, about a month after the window has closed. All summer long we have been coveting footballers, praising them, salivating over them. Now, just a few weeks in, many of those same players are now being disdained as broken goods. Should we start to worry about Jamie Gittens? Was Arsenal's purchase of Viktor Gyökeres necessary? What was the purpose of Randal Kolo Muani?

A Wider Issue

It feels appropriate that he meets their rivals on Sunday: a team at once 13 months unbeaten at their stadium in the league and somehow in their own situation of feverish crisis, like filing a missing person’s report on someone who popped to the shops 30 minutes ago. Too open. Their star past his prime. The striker waste of money. The coach losing his hair.

Perhaps we have failed to understand the way the storyline of football has begun to supplant football itself, to inflect the way we view it, an entire sport reoriented around discussion topics and reaction, something that occurs in the backdrop while we scroll through our phones, incapable to detach from the saline drip of takes and further hot takes. It may be Sesko taking the hit at present. However, everyone is losing a part of the experience in this process.