Benjamin Sesko: Another Victim of Soccer's Unforgiving Conveyor Belt of Opinions and Memes

Picture the following: a happy the Danish striker in a Napoli shirt. Next, place it with a dejected the Slovenian forward sporting United's jersey, appearing like he's missed a sitter. Don't bother finding an actual photo of that miss; context is your adversary. Then, include statistics in a big, comical font. Don't forget some emoticons. Post it across all platforms.

Will you point out that Højlund's tally features strikes in the Champions League while his counterpart isn't playing in Europe? Of course not. Nor will you note that four of the Dane's goals were scored versus Belarus and Greece, or that Denmark is much stronger to Slovenia and creates many more chances. If you run social media for a large outlet, pure interaction is what pays the bills, Manchester United are the biggest draw, and nuance is your sworn enemy.

Thus the cycle of content turns. Your next task is to sift through a lengthy podcast with the legendary goalkeeper and find the part where he describes the acquisition of Sesko "strange". Just before, where Schmeichel qualifies his remarks by saying, "Nothing negative to say about Benjamin Sesko"... yes, cut that. Nobody needs that. Just make sure "weird" and "Sesko" are paired in the title. The audience will be furious.

This Time of Potential and Premature Judgment

Mid-autumn has long been one of my favourite times to observe 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 season ahead are planting their flags. The summer market is closed. No one is talking about the quadruple yet. All teams are in contention. Right now, anything is possible.

Yet, for many of the same reasons, mid-autumn has also been one of my least favourite times to read about football. Because although no outcomes are decided, something must always be getting settled. Jack Grealish is resurgent. The German talent has been a major letdown. Is Antoine Semenyo the top performer in the league right now? Please an answer now.

The Player as Patient Zero

In many ways, Sesko feels like the archetype in this respect, a player caught between football's opposing, non-negotiable forces. The need to withhold final conclusions, to let technical development and tactical sophistication to mature. And the imperative to generate instant definitive judgment, a conveyor belt of takes and memes, context-free criticisms and pointless comparisons, a puzzle that can not truly be circled.

It is not my aim to offer a in-depth evaluation of Sesko's stint at United so far. The guy has been in the lineup four times in the Premier League in a wildly inconsistent team, scored two goals, and had a mere of 116 contacts with the ball. What exactly are we evaluating? Nor will I attempt to replicate Gary Neville's and Ian Wright's seminal masterwork "Argument Over Benjamin Sesko", in which two of England's leading pundits duel thrillingly on a popular show over whether he needs 10 goals to be a success this season (one pundit), or whether it's really more like 12 or 13 (the other).

A Cruel Environment

Despite this I enjoyed watching him at Leipzig: a powerful, screeching sports car of a forward, playing in a team pitched perfectly to his abilities: afforded the freedom to attack but also the leeway 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 about the time it takes to watch a short advertisement, the club with the largest and most ruthless gulf between the time and air he requires, and the time and air he is going to get.

We saw a case of this over the national team pause, when a viral infographic handily stated that the player had been deemed – by a wide margin – the worst signing of the recent market by a survey of football representatives. Naturally, the press are by no means the only ones in this. Team social media, influencers, anonymous X accounts with a oddly high number of fake followers: everybody with a vested interest is now essentially aligned along the same principles, an environment deliberately geared for provocation.

The Mental Cost

Endless scrolling and tapping. What is happening to us? Do we realize, on any level, what this infinite stream of aggravation is doing to our minds? Quite apart from the essential weirdness of playing in the center of this, knowing on some surreal chain-reaction level that every single thing about players is now essentially content, product, public property to be repackaged and exchanged.

And yes, in part this is because it's Manchester United, the corpse that keeps nourishing the narrative, a big club that must constantly be producing the big feelings. But also, partly this is a temporary malaise, a pendulum of opinion most clearly and cruelly observed at this time of year, roughly four weeks after the transfer market shut. Throughout the summer we have been coveting players, eulogising them, salivating over them. Now, just a few weeks in, many of those same players are now being disdained as broken goods. Is it time to be concerned about a new signing? Was Arsenal's purchase of their striker necessary? What was the purpose of Randal Kolo Muani?

The Bigger Picture

It seems fitting that Sesko meets Liverpool on the weekend: a team simultaneously on a long unbeaten run at their stadium in the Premier League and yet in their own situation of feverish crisis, like submitting a missing person’s report on a person who went to the store half an hour ago. Defensively suspect. Their star finished. The striker an expensive flop. Arne Slot bald.

Maybe we have not yet quite grasped the way the narrative of football has begun to supplant football itself, to influence the way we view it, an entire sport repivoted around discussion topics and immediate responses, something that occurs in the background while we scroll through our devices, unable to disconnect from the constant flow of takes and further hot takes. Perhaps this player taking the hit at present. However, everyone is sacrificing a part of the experience in this process.