The Champions League Final.
360 million television viewers (and 1.8m on YouTube) around the world tuned in to see European football's showpiece event, most of whom are just waiting for that moment they can tweet about, or talk about in work or school on Monday morning.
Will it be a moment of magic from Cristiano Ronaldo? Will one of Atleti's finest talents such as Antoine Griezmann or Saul Niguez create a career-defining moment? Will something like a crucial penalty miss in the shootout be the last memory from the game that is talked about for years to come?
No. The most notorious moment of the 2016 Champions League final was, and will be, a moment (or, stunningly, moments) of true shithousery from one of the most dastardly players ever to set foot on a football pitch.
Gary Lineker said it best:
Pepe is such a dick!
— Gary Lineker (@GaryLineker) May 28, 2016
And then again around an hour later:
Pepe is an enormous dick.
— Gary Lineker (@GaryLineker) May 28, 2016
There really is no better way to say it. The guy is just a dick.
To be aware of how many eyes are on you, to realise that what you are doing is everything that both those who love and those who hate the game of football despise, and then to not only do it once, but to do it twice in the same night, is simply indefensible.
In Milan on Saturday night, we saw an example of someone who values winning more than anything, to the point where he is willing to be the face of evil in the world of football. To be a player remembered for being a horrible bastard.
That is a huge thing to take on. To knowingly accept that you will be remembered as a cheater and a "thug", and completely embrace it. His bastardry is something we have never before seen in the game.
He is lucky that Mark Clattenburg's reptilian reaction steered the talking point away from him somewhat, but at the end of the day the discussion comes back to Pepe and his track-record of using the biggest stage he can to be the greatest arsehole he can be.
Every time Barcelona play Real Madrid, something excruciatingly petty seems to inevitably kick off. There is bad blood between the two camps, they hate each other as much as Spanish football insists that they hate each other, but the common denominator seems to, more often than not, be Pepe, unable to control his disdain for his opponents. These are the most watched games in the world, and more often than not everybody leaves disappointed.
A great piece in The Guardian by Sean Ingle, published in the immediate aftermath of Pepe's latest dick-move, asked why is he not being punished for simulation?
Clattenburg saw him pretending to be hit in the face in an attempt to have his opponent sent off, and gave him nothing more than a flick of his tongue and a look of shame. He should have been booked. He would have been outraged, but Clattenburg need only have smiled and told him to wait for the replays.
Maybe if he was being punished for these acts, then he would stop them? Actually, no. Pepe transcends the idea that you learn from your mistakes.
We're talking about a man who was given a 10 game suspension for an assault on a Getafe player in 2009. 7 years later here we could argue whether or not it even gets into his "Top 10 Most Insane & Crazy Moments HD"...
And yet apparently he's a great bloke off the pitch.
Tubes of Soccer AM had recently been letting his twitter followers know that having met and worked with Pepe, he completely changed his tune on him and expressed what a gentlemen he had been in his presence.
The interview that they uploaded to YouTube and featured on the show is even called 'Is Pepe the nicest footballer ever?'...
Spoiler: No, he's not.
Having worked with athletes on PR days like the one Pepe was involved with above, I know how tiresome and frustrating those things can be for the players. A player who shows politeness and respect for someone who is interviewing them after they have been sat there answering similar questions all day is always greatly appreciated, and I am sure that if I was to meet Pepe at one of these events then I would meet a perfectly respectable guy, but there is a clear switch that is flicked in the brain of the Portuguese when it's time for business.
A guy from modest beginnings, when he's not playing football he comes across as humble and respectful, but as soon as he crosses that white line it's 'win at all costs' no matter how badly you make yourself, or indeed your club, look.
Much like Luis Suarez and his infamous bites, it's a reaction that cannot be helped. Desperation to win takes over. However, at this stage in Luis Suarez's career it is clear for all to see that he has calmed down, and the maturity that comes with age and experience has had a positive effect.
For Pepe, on the other hand, it's still frighteningly common at 33 years of age. He hasn't learned, he has only become more ridiculous.
So where do we go from here? If Pepe isn't going to learn, then we should learn from him. If a referee spots a player clearly feigning injury then he must be booked. Clattenburg had every right to caution Pepe in Milan, and if he did it the first time then maybe we would have been spared the encore.
Sadly, the much more likely option is that we all agree that Pepe is a dick and wait for him to retire before moving onto the next panto villain.
Meanwhile, Pepe couldn't give less of a shit.
It's sort of sickening, isn't it?
