0‑21 against Atlético Madrid. The honest reading is not that the players were poor; it is that the distance between this club and that one is currently measured in things money takes years to buy.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 17 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
7 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Hakeeb Adelakun was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match12 Dec 2028
Nobody could stop scoring
21 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Skonto and Atlético Madrid in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad18 Dec 2028
Abdoul Bane falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Hakeeb Adelakun was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Skonto can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
32 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Skonto lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Hakeeb Adelakun was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad23 Oct 2028
Abdoul Bane falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Nobody at Skonto will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Kaspars Bulvitis may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 14 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
48 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Skonto lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
1‑18. Atlético Madrid play this football every year and it showed in every part of the pitch. The lesson is expensive and, for a club at this stage, probably necessary.
Jay McEvoy and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 19 goals between Skonto and Atlético Madrid, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
The words a physio says slowly. 83 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Skonto, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Olimpija Ljubljana keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Words at Skonto training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jay McEvoy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Skonto know it.
Nobody at Skonto will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The words a physio says slowly. 113 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Jelgava waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Skonto is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Skonto can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Skonto asked and Flora said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jay McEvoy was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The phone has started ringing about Olegs Oss again, and this time the name on the line is Ventspils. Skonto are listening politely and promising nothing.
Squad14 Aug 2028
7 new faces, and Skonto are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Jelgava waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Skonto is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Skonto, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Skonto will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
7 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Squad17 Jul 2028
Words at Skonto training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jérôme Bonou is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Skonto, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Skonto have done the hard part with Banik Ostrava, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Stade Malien is saying, and nobody at Skonto is enjoying the guessing.
Spartaks will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Skonto were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Player ratings8 May 2028
A brace, and Kaspars Oss takes the afternoon — 9.53
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Kaspars Oss provided it, and the 9.53 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Skonto can pretend not to have heard.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
He is 21, he is averaging 7.07, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Bálint Geiger and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad8 May 2028
Words at Skonto training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Adam Paar is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Skonto can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
There were 86 minutes on the clock and Liepaja had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Skonto did not stop to explain themselves.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Skonto, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings3 Apr 2028
Jay McEvoy, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.87
A mark of 7.87 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Bálint Geiger falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Skonto will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Hakeeb Adelakun and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Adam Paar falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Nobody at Skonto will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Spartaks in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
In brief
The dugoutJanis Vanins knocks on the manager's door
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 28 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Skonto can pretend not to have heard.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Adam Paar falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Arturs Kamess has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Eduards Tarasovs has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Pavels Dubra is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 51 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Position 3 and 21 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Adam Paar falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Kristers Penkevics was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Kaspars Bulvitis is on it.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Skonto will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bálint Geiger was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The name of Kristaps Dubra has come up in conversations Skonto were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Skonto will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Position 3, 21 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Sad'eeq Yusuf has, at Skonto, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad20 Dec 2027
Words at Skonto training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Adam Paar is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Jay McEvoy and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 105 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Hakeeb Adelakun and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad22 Nov 2027
Words at Skonto training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Adam Paar is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Position 3 and 21 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Bálint Geiger falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Justice Apaingolo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Kaspars Bulvitis is on it.
A manager forgives a bad Saturday far more readily than a bad Tuesday, because one of them he can explain and the other one he chose. The reports this week have not been good.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Adam Paar was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Skonto will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Skonto people have started saying his name in the past tense.
$220.0K on the table at Liepaja. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Jelgava pay $9.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Adam Paar falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The phone has started ringing about Arturs Vanins again, and this time the name on the line is Spartaks. Skonto are listening politely and promising nothing.
Iason Georgakopoulos and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Hajduk Split have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
24 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Skonto lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Skonto people have started saying his name in the past tense.
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $4.2M for Hakeeb Adelakun, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bálint Geiger was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
32 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Skonto lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Skonto have done the hard part with Doncaster Rovers, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Skonto, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Skonto is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
A season average of 7.20 with 8 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
The dugout26 Jul 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Olegs Gabovs left the room before anybody could ask which.
47 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Skonto lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Skonto is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Olympiacos have kept their man, and Skonto go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Skonto have made the call to Slavia Prague. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Nobody at Skonto will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The words a physio says slowly. 63 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Skonto can pretend not to have heard.
$79.0K was the most the club would pay and Liepaja were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Justice Apaingolo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Skonto will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“Judge me on him.” Managers do not say that kind of thing by accident — it moves the pressure from Krišs Kārkliņš’s shoulders onto his own, and both of them know it.
In brief
SquadQuestions about Janis Ciganovs on the training pitch
Loan watchDavis Gabovs watches his loan from the bench
102 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Skonto lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Olegs Oss and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Squad24 May 2027
Pavels Dubra falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Metta/LU defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Every debut is a small story about the future: Pavels Jagodinskis, 17 years old, off the academy pitches and into the first team. The parents in the stand will keep the programme.
The manager wanted a different profile for this opponent, which is a real football reason and no consolation. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 92th minute. Daugavpils will replay every second of the added time for a week.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Kaspars Oss did not need any: 7.73, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
3 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
The fixture the rest of the division is looking forward to more than either of the sides in it. Both know a win changes the season and a defeat does not end it, which is what makes it hard to play.
The words a physio says slowly. 14 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Two goals and a mark of 8.54 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Skonto can pretend not to have heard.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Gatis Kamess. 3‑1 against Spartaks, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Justice Apaingolo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Position 3, 14 points, and every result so far reduced to one line. The second half of the season starts with the same squad and a different set of expectations.
Roberts Jagodinskis was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The words a physio says slowly. 37 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Position 2, 11 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Justice Apaingolo and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Kaspars Oss has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Ventspils next, and the two sides the division is watching meet each other. Whoever wins will be told nothing is decided in the same breath as being congratulated.
45 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Skonto lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Marcis Savalnieks provided it, and the 8.85 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Roberts Jagodinskis and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Chibueze Oputa has come out of that comparison in the side, and Skonto have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Olegs Gabovs on a 2‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
75 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Skonto lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 42 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Justice Apaingolo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Raivis Oss has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Igors Fertovs is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Kaspars Bulvitis has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Pavels Jagodinskis is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
107 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Skonto lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 74 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Skonto people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Gatis Fertovs was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Justice Apaingolo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.