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Picture the following: a happy Rasmus Højlund in a Napoli shirt. Now, place it with a sad-looking the Slovenian forward sporting United's jersey, appearing like he's missed a sitter. Do not worry locating an actual photo of him missing; background information is the enemy. Now, add some goal stats in a large, comical font. Remember some emoticons. Post it everywhere.

Will you mention that Højlund's goal count features scores in the premier European competition while his counterpart isn't playing in continental tournaments? Certainly not. And will you note that several of Højlund's goals came against Belarus and Greece, or that his national team is much stronger to Slovenia and creates far more scoring opportunities. If you manage online for a large outlet, pure interaction is what pays the bills, Manchester United are the biggest draw, and context is the thing to avoid.

So the cycle of online material turns. The next job is to scan a lengthy interview featuring the legendary goalkeeper and find the part where he calls the signing of Sesko "strange". There's a bit, where he qualifies his remarks by saying, "I have nothing bad to say about Benjamin Sesko"... well, remove that part. No one needs that. Just make sure "strange" and "Sesko" are paired in the headline. People will be outraged.

The Season of Promise and Premature Judgment

Mid-autumn has traditionally one of my preferred 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 coming months are planting their flags. The summer market is closed. No one is mentioning the multiple trophies yet. All teams are still in the game. Right now, anything is possible.

Yet, for many of the same reasons, mid-autumn has also been one of my least favourite times to consume news on football. Because although nothing has yet been settled, something must always be getting settled. The City winger is resurgent. The German talent has been a crushing disappointment. Could Semenyo be the best player in the league right now? We need an answer now.

Sesko as The Prime Example

And for numerous reasons, Benjamin Sesko feels like Patient Zero in this context, a player inextricably trapped between football's opposing, unavoidable forces. The imperative to withhold definitive judgment, allowing technical development and tactical sophistication to develop. And the demand to produce permanent definitive judgment, a constant stream of opinions and memes, out-of-context criticisms and meaningless comparisons, a puzzle that can not truly be solved.

I do not propose to provide a in-depth analysis of Sesko's stint at United so far. He has started four times in the Premier League in a highly unpredictable team, scored two goals, and had a mere of 116 contacts with the ball. What precisely are we evaluating? Nor will I attempt to duplicate Gary Neville's and Ian Wright's notable debate "Argument Over Benjamin Sesko", in which two famous analysts argue passionately on a popular show over whether he needs 10 goals to be deemed successful this season (Neville), or whether it is more like 12 or 13 (the other).

A Cruel Environment

For all this I enjoyed watching him at his former club: a big, fast sports car of a forward, playing in a team ideally suited to his abilities: given the freedom to attack but also the leeway to miss. Partly this is why Manchester United feels like the cruellest place he could possibly be right now: a place where "brutal verdicts" are summarily issued in about the time it takes to watch a pre-roll ad, the club with the largest and most pitiless gulf between the time and air he needs, and the time and air he is going to get.

We saw an example of this over the national team pause, when a viral infographic conveniently stated that the player had been judged – by a wide margin – the worst signing of the summer transfer window by a poll of 20 agents. Naturally, the media are not the only ones in such behavior. Team social media, online personalities, anonymous X accounts with a suspiciously high number of pornbot followers: all parties with skin in the game is now basically aligned along the identical rules, an environment deliberately nosed towards controversy.

The Mental Cost

Endless scrolling and tapping. What is happening to us? Do we realize, on any level, what this endless stream of aggravation is doing to our brains? Quite apart from the essential weirdness of playing in the middle 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.

And yes, partly this is because United are United, the entity that keeps nourishing the narrative, a major institution that must always be producing the big feelings. However, partly this is a seasonal affliction, a swing of judgment most clearly and harshly observed at this season, roughly four weeks after the window has closed. All summer long we have been desiring players, eulogising them, salivating over them. Now, just a few weeks in, many of those same players are now being disdained as failures. Is it time to be concerned about Jamie Gittens? Was Arsenal's purchase of Viktor Gyökeres necessary? What was the point of another expensive buy?

The Bigger Picture

It feels appropriate that he faces Liverpool on Sunday: a team at once 13 months unbeaten at home in the league and yet in their own state of feverish crisis, like filing a a report on a person who popped to the shops 30 minutes ago. Defensively suspect. Their star finished. The striker waste of money. Arne Slot bald.

Perhaps we have failed to understand the way the narrative of football has begun to supplant football the actual game, to influence the way we watch it, an whole competition repivoted around discussion topics and reaction, something that occurs in the background while we scroll through our phones, unable to detach from the saline drip of opinions and more takes. Perhaps Sesko taking the hit right now. However, we're all losing a part of the experience in this process.