Juventus can end their 21-year wait for Champions League glory next month when they take on Real Madrid in the final, but winning will mean more to one player than most.

Now 39-years-old and approaching the end of his career, Gianluigi Buffon has achieved everything he possibly can in Turin - except the Champions League.

June 3's final likely represents Buffon's last chance to avoid joining a list of football greats to have never won Europe's elite competition throughout their playing careers.

Indeed, Fabio Cannavaro, Brazilian Ronaldo, Pavel Nedved and Diego Maradona never added the Champions League to their trophy cabinet. Nor, it seems, will Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

Buffon deserves to win based on his performances for Juventus in this season's competition alone, having kept clean sheets against Barcelona in both legs of the quarter-finals.

Very rarely do Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar fail to find the back of the net, yet they did so twice against the Italy legend.

As you would expect, Buffon is desperate to win the Champions League with Juve third time around having finished as a runner-up in 2003 and 2015.

"We are in the final, but now reaching the final counts for nothing," the veteran said after beating Monaco 4-1 in the semi-finals.

"I am very happy, because I've got here in good shape and if I wasn't in a big club and with great teammates, I would never have come back into the Champions League final."

One advantage Juventus have over Real heading into the final is their superior defence, having conceded just three goals all competition.

Buffon, with Dani Alves, Giorgio Chiellini and Leonardo Bonucci in front of him, has been an impenetrable force in Europe and will look to do the same against Cristiano Ronaldo and co.

So good have Juventus' defence been, in fact, that Buffon has broken a pretty incredible personal record in the Champions League this season.

According to UEFA (see below), the Italian went 600 minutes without conceding a goal in Europe, including 90 minutes against Porto (x2), Barcelona (x2) and Monaco (x1).

Now that's impressive. Real have been in free-scoring form this season but even they may struggle to score past Juventus based on current form.

Football fans worldwide want nothing more than for Buffon to finally lift the Champions League trophy and there's a good chance he'll do just that in two weeks' time.