Luis is late again, but brings coffee: prosecutors drop all charges.

Expected on court 3 at 7:02 pm, the accused appeared at 7:21 pm holding four cups. The court adjourned to drink them.

From our special correspondent at the edge of court 3 · Tuesday Padel

The case looked open and shut. According to the notebook kept by Rafa, whose rigour nobody questions, Luis had racked up fourteen late arrivals this season, averaging seventeen minutes, with a record of thirty-one set on a rainy evening. The club's prosecutor, convened in emergency session, was seeking the maximum sentence: serving the first game until the end of the year.

That is when the accused appeared at the gate with no racket in his right hand. In his left, a cardboard carrier. Four coffees, one of them a long black with no sugar, "the way Marta likes it", he added, though nobody had asked.

Sources close to the net say the defence never had to speak. The file was closed "for good caffeinated conduct", a category never before seen in Tuesday case law. Rafa nonetheless wrote the arrival time in his notebook, on principle.

Asked on his way out, Luis said he would be "on time next week". Rafa wrote the time in his notebook. Then he put his coffee down on it.