🔗 Share this article

Picture the following: a happy Rasmus Højlund in a Napoli shirt. Next, juxtapose it with a sad-looking the Slovenian forward sporting United's jersey, looking as if he's missed a sitter. Do not bother locating a real picture of that miss; context is the enemy. Now, add some goal stats in a big, comical font. Don't forget some emoticons. Share it across all platforms.

Will you point out that Højlund's tally features scores in the premier European competition while his counterpart isn't playing in continental tournaments? Of course not. Nor would you note that four of the Dane's goals were scored versus weaker national sides, or that his national team is much stronger to Slovenia and creates far more chances. You run social media for a major brand, pure engagement is what pays the bills, Manchester United are the prime target, and context is your sworn enemy.

So the wheel of online material turns. Your next task is to sift through a lengthy interview featuring Peter Schmeichel and extract the part where he calls the acquisition of Sesko "strange". Just before, where he prefaces his remarks by saying, "I have nothing bad to say about Benjamin Sesko"... yes, remove that part. Nobody wants that. Just ensure "strange" and "the player" are paired in the title. The audience will be outraged.

The Season of Promise and Hasty Opinions

Mid-autumn has long been one of my preferred periods to observe football. Leaves fall, winds shift, the teams and tactics are still fresh, all is novel and yet patterns are emerging. Key players of the season ahead are planting their flags. The transfer window is shut. Nobody is talking about the multiple trophies yet. Everyone are in contention. Right now, all is possibility.

Yet, for similar reasons, this period has also been one of my least favourite times to consume news on football. For while no outcomes are decided, something must always be getting settled. Jack Grealish is reborn. Florian Wirtz has been a crushing disappointment. Is Antoine Semenyo the top performer in the league at this moment? We need an answer immediately.

Sesko as The Prime Example

In many ways, Sesko feels like the archetype 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 strategic understanding to develop. And the imperative to produce instant definitive judgment, a conveyor belt of takes and jokes, context-free criticisms and pointless comparisons, a puzzle that can not truly be circled.

I do not propose to offer a in-depth analysis of Sesko's time at United so far. He has been in the lineup on four occasions in the top flight in a highly unpredictable team, scored two goals, and had a grand total of 116 contacts with the ball. What exactly are we evaluating? And will I attempt to duplicate Gary Neville's and Ian Wright's notable debate "The Sesko Debate", in which two of England's leading pundits duel passionately on a podcast over whether he needs 10 goals to be a success this season (one pundit), or whether it is more like twelve or thirteen (Wright).

A Cruel Environment

For all this I enjoyed watching him at Leipzig: a powerful, screeching sports car of a forward, playing in a team ideally suited to his abilities: afforded the license to attack but also the leeway to fail. Partly this is why Manchester United feels like the cruellest place he could possibly be right now: a place where "harsh judgments" are handed down in about the time it takes to load a short advertisement, the club with the widest and most ruthless gulf between the time and air he needs, and the time and air he is likely to receive.

We saw a case of this over the national team pause, when a viral chart conveniently stated that Sesko had been deemed – by a wide margin – the poorest acquisition of the summer transfer window by a survey of football representatives. Naturally, the media are by no means alone in such behavior. Club channels, influencers, anonymous X accounts with a oddly high number of pornbot followers: everybody with skin in the game is now basically aligned along the identical rules, an ecosystem deliberately geared for provocation.

The Psychological Toll

Scroll, scroll, tap, scroll. What is happening to ourselves? Do we realize, on any level, what this infinite sluice of aggravation is doing to our minds? Quite apart from the inherent strangeness of playing in the middle of it all, aware on some surreal butterfly-effect level that each aspect about them is now basically material, product, open-source property to be repackaged and exchanged.

And yes, partly this is because it's Manchester United, the entity that keeps nourishing the narrative, a major institution that must constantly be generating the strong emotions. However, partly this is a temporary malaise, a pendulum of judgment most clearly and cruelly glimpsed at this season, roughly four weeks after the transfer market shut. Throughout the summer we have been desiring footballers, praising them, drooling over them. Yet, just a few weeks in, many of those very players are already being disdained as failures. Should we start to worry about Jamie Gittens? Did Arsenal actually need Viktor Gyökeres wise? What was the point of another expensive buy?

The Bigger Picture

It seems fitting that Sesko faces their rivals on the weekend: a team at once 13 months unbeaten at their stadium in the league and yet in their own situation of perceived turmoil, like submitting a a report on someone who went to the shops 30 minutes ago. Too open. Their star finished. Alexander Isak waste of money. The coach losing his hair.

Maybe we have not yet quite grasped the way the narrative of football has begun to supplant football itself, to inflect the way we watch it, an whole competition reoriented around talking points and immediate responses, something that happens in the background while we browse through our devices, incapable to disconnect from the constant flow of takes and more takes. It may be Sesko taking the hit right now. But in a way, everyone is losing a part of the experience in this process.