SOCCER:HISTORY, WE were left in little doubt by a string of reporters doing a well rehearsed line in gravitas, is lurking about the corridors of the new Wembley waiting to rest its hand upon the collective shoulder of the tonight's victors.

Whether it will be Barcelona who emulate the team of 1992 that beat Sampdoria, however, or Manchester United who rekindle the spirit of Bobby Charlton and co in ’68 the two managers stubbornly refused to say. Until somebody actually lifts the silverware this evening, they made clear, a fear of tempting fate is the most immediate concern for Alex Ferguson and Pep Guardiola.

The bookies are a little more forthcoming and have the game marked down as a virtually sure-fire rerun of Rome two years ago where Barca were comfortable enough winners thanks to goals by Lionel Messi and Samuel Eto’o.

Ferguson has repeatedly advised against assuming the outcome this time will be the same, but his opposite number says his side are determined to play better than they did then and so the Scot finds himself under some pressure to strike upon a more reliable formula for success than he conjured up that evening.

His problem is that his players will be up against a team that is regarded as the best of all time. Guardiola played down the idea, insisting that nobody really is in a position to compare the greatest teams of different ages. Flawlessly humble as he was in more languages than Uefa had provided translation for, however, there was the sense that the 40-year-old believes deep down he can guide this most gifted of attacking sides to a third European title in six years just as he helped to engineer the ’92 win from central midfield.

If Ferguson is to stop his opposite number then he must play his cards well but then the United boss has had few enough bad nights on that score. The most obvious choices are to be made in midfield, where Darren Fletcher’s return alongside Michael Carrick would signal another cautious approach by the manager, and attack where various Arsenal players have been queuing up to suggest in recent days that Javier Hernandez should be dropped in order to facilitate a switch to a defensive take on 4-3-3.

Ferguson’s demeanour, though, has suggested he will be more positive than that this time around. Fletcher seems unlikely to make the cut given his recent lengthy lay-off and so Ryan Giggs could again play a key role alongside Carrick, while the Mexican’s form, as well as the impact he has been having on Rooney’s, suggests he must start.

When beating Barcelona at the semi-final stage last year, Inter worked tirelessly to stifle in midfield but managed to maintain a threat up front and clearly United must do the same.

The stats offer some hope to the Premier League outfit too, with Pep Guardiola’s side having comfortably outscored their rivals on the way to this final but having also conceded twice as many goals.

The former Barca star, who Ferguson admitted yesterday he had tried to sign for United nearly a decade ago, has choices to make himself in that department with Eric Abidal’s successful negotiation of the last few, rather low-key games of the season, offering the possibility, however slight, that he might just be ready to return to the starting line-up for this, the season’s most important game.

The temptation must be great, for Abidal has commanded new levels of respect for the way he has coped since having a tumour removed from his liver. There is the small matter, too, of him being a significantly better left-back than Carles Puyol, himself coming back from a knee problem, while getting to restore the team captain’s central defensive partnership with Gerard Pique would be a bonus given that Barca won 15 and drew three of the 18 games in which the pair played alongside each other.

Hernandez and Wayne Rooney and the supporting cast out wide have the potential to have a major say but outside of defence, Guardiola’s men look comfortably superior. In midfield, where the contest seems likely to be decided, the gap is particularly pronounced and if his players there are allowed to hit their stride then the game will almost certainly be up for United.

The Catalans are handy enough in attack too and there has been a fair bit of debate in the media as to whether Lionel Messi might be a contender to be considered the best player of all time. That scale of praise might be premature but at just 23 he is nicely on course to rival the achievements of Pele and Maradona. He can strengthen the case made on his behalf tonight while his team have the capacity to win what has the potential to be a great and historic game of football.