Breakdown of Vanhat sukseni saattavat mennä rikki.
vanha
old
mennä
to go
rikki
broken
saattaa
may, might
suksi
the ski
Questions & Answers about Vanhat sukseni saattavat mennä rikki.
Saattaa can also mean 'to escort' or 'to accompany'. How do we know it means 'might' here?
When saattaa is followed by a verb in its dictionary form (the 1st infinitive, like mennä), it acts as an epistemic modal verb meaning 'might' or 'may'. This structure is used to express that something is possible.
Why is the verb in the plural form saattavat rather than just saattaa?
Unlike some other Finnish structures that express necessity (where the verb freezes in the 3rd person singular, like täytyy), the modal verb saattaa fully agrees with its subject. Since the subject is plural ('my skis'), the verb takes the third-person plural ending -vat.
The translation says 'my skis', but where is the plural marker in the word sukseni?
The standard nominative plural ending is -t, which we can see clearly in the adjective Vanhat. However, when you add a possessive suffix like -ni, that -t drops off entirely. We only know sukseni is plural here because the surrounding words (Vanhat and saattavat) are in the plural form.
Why are we using the verb mennä (to go) when talking about something breaking?
In Finnish, physical objects typically do not just 'break' via a single verb; rather, they 'go broken'. The phrase mennä rikki is the standard, everyday way to express that a physical object breaks.
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