ONE of the rum things about football is the way that the very best are so often the most beautiful. The most effective way of playing football so often pleases us, not only because it works supremely well, but because it also thrills us with its beauty.

Ronaldinho and Thierry Henry on the same pitch, competing for the greatest prize in club football: it is a wonderful prospect, not just for the number of goals they might score, but also for the nature of the goals they might score. The setting of the Champions League final seems to demand from either — or even both — a masterpiece. We crave, we almost expect, a goal of such sublime perfection that we will talk about it for the rest of our lives.

And that is the thing that gives the expectation of this match its unique savour: the feeling that the presence of one might inspire the other to reach beyond even those lofty things he has already managed. It is like Bach v Mozart, each seeking to please the ear, Monet v Matisse, each seeking to please the eye. But in fact, it’s Ronaldinho v Henry, each seeking to beguile the footballing senses.

It’s almost too much to bear. That is because the threat of disappointment is so overbearing. It has to be admitted that a football match very rarely follows the script, and that, obviously enough, is because there is no script. A football match happens spontaneously — we don’t know what happens next. So often, these highly charged and over-anticipated events are decided by the last person you expected: a comparatively obscure player seizing the moment of his life, Lawrie Sanchez-like.

This is disconcerting for the spectator, doubly so for the journalist who had neglected to research the life and times of the obscure fellow so unexpectedly seizing his moment. The scars of such occasions prepare us for disappointment.

But our hopes for the unbearably wonderful are never quite extinguished. The fact remains that truly great players rise to great occasions. The question tonight, then, is whether or not Henry and/or Ronaldinho is truly great. In the course of the next six or seven weeks, either of these men could secure a reputation as the finest footballer in the world, one of the best that ever drew breath. Both have an opportunity that is there for the seizing. The process of seizing begins with tonight’s affair in Paris and continues with the World Cup in Germany.

We know that both players are unquestionably brilliant. But greatness? That is another matter. Both have the potential. Greatness in sport is about many things, but more than anything else it is about producing your greatest performance on the greatest occasion.

Not next week: now. And tonight, it really could happen. Different methods. Henry has a kind of high-speed cool, Ronaldinho a languid, almost reflective quality. What they have in common is an ability to see and understand a football match in a way that nobody else can. That is because they see football through the lens of their own talents, and that can be gloriously disconcerting for those who watch with a more mundane kind of vision.

Anxiety dominates big sporting occasions. That is especially true of semi-finals: Henry and Arsenal gave a horribly angst-ridden performance over the two legs. That is to be expected, to be understood.

But not in a final. A final is both an achievement and an opportunity, and it is axiomatic that the great seize such opportunities. Some of the greats shake off all anxiety at this stage, others alchemise the anxiety into the gold of genius. It’s all in the way that greatness takes you — that is, if greatness takes you at all.

So, yes, it will be horribly disappointing if neither man rises to fulfil the almost ludicrous levels of expectation. But then it is also a fact that great players meet such wild aspirations. That is another example of what greatness means. It will be disappointment because it will show us that the two men in question are slightly less than we thought (or hoped) they were. But if one or other (or both) does rise to the great occasion, he will do so by the means of beauty.

Plenty of fine footballers have pace or force or directness or skill, but that additional dimension of beauty we associate with the very best.

And it’s a matter that takes us beyond partisanship. It is a fact that all of us with a taste for football are partisans for the club of excellence. And if we are barred from joining, that never stopped us from expressing our support.

I hope to see a victory for Club Excellence tonight: certainly, we’ll support you evermore.