A couple of months ago, a photo appeared on social media showing a group of boiler-suited, mask-wearing shipyard staff huddled around a table strewn with coffee cups and documents in a small room.

The beaming face in the foreground taking the selfie had gleefully captioned it “We’re back.”

The shot summed up the desire by many in the newbuilding and sale-and-purchase markets to return to something like the face-to-face world of pre-Covid-19 days.