The green rectangle of plastic grass glistened with no hint of the demons said to be lurking within and the Bodo/Glimt players fizzed passes about on a surface slick with Arctic drizzle.
Around them, workers were busy adorning the Aspmyra Stadium with the final trimmings for its biggest night, fixing UEFA branding in the appropriate areas and running TV cables around the simple stands.
Beyond that, the stillness of a Norwegian fishing town where day broke at 3am, the calls of the gulls, the rumble of a tractor spreading rubber crumb over an artificial training pitch and the occasional fighter jet tearing through the sky on a training exercise.