JUVENTUS LEGEND GIANLUIGI BUFFON WAS CONVINCED HE'D GET ANOTHER CHANCE AT THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE AFTER 2

Gianluigi Buffon will become the oldest player to win the European Cup if Juventus complete their Treble on Saturday night.

For a veteran who has remained faithful to the Old Lady of Turin for 16 years, their alliance borders on matrimony.

At the age of 39 years and 126 days, keeper Buffon accepts the Champions League final against Real Madrid, in Cardiff, may be his last chance to win the only major honour to elude one of European football’s greats.

And, for all the genius and hubris assembled by Zinedine Zidane among Real’s Galacticos, nobody at the Principality Stadium – not even Welsh superstar and hometown boy Gareth Bale – will have a greater incentive to hoist the 11kg trophy above the River Taff than Buffon.

From Italy’s most-capped player to the world’s most expensive keeper – with the changes in the conversion rate, the £35million deal Manchester City just struck with Benfica for Ederson falls way short of the €53m Juve paid for ‘Gigi’ in 2001 – he has been incomparable and impregnable.

His compatriot Dino Zoff was 41 when he played in what was then called the European Cup final, 34 years ago, as Juve lost to Hamburg.

But if the Old Lady crosses the road safely this time, Buffon will surpass the great Hungarian Ferenc Puskas, who was 39 years and 39 days old when he helped Real Madrid win it in 1966.

 Juventus have already won a sixth consecutive Scudetto in Serie A and the Coppa Italia. Now Buffon has another shot at landing the jewel in the crown.

Think of a record in his art, and Buffon has probably broken it.

The man in Italy's goal as they won the 2006 World Cup final against France on penalties admitted: “I have always maintained that, in football, making the final means nothing if you don’t win it.

"I don’t look at the Champions League as the trophy that evades me – but, yes, it is a big dream for me to win it.

“After the defeat to Barcelona in the final, two years ago, many people thought I would never have another chance, but I always believed that, if we worked hard, I would get another opportunity – and this time we must make it count.