The final of the AFF Mitsubishi Electric Cup 2022 pits two together of Southeast Asia's football heavyweights but there's another, equally competitive, battle to be decided over the two legs in Hanoi and Bangkok.
Already well clear of the eligible chasing pack, the race to be the tournament's top goalscorer is surely now down to a head-to-head tussle between Vietnam's Nguyen Tien Linh and Thailand's Teerasil Dangda.
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It is, in every sense, a contest for the ages: the emerging superstar, who has gone from youth prodigy to established first-team marksman, against an undisputed legend of the region.
Heading into the first leg in Hanoi on Friday, it's Teerasil who has the slight edge with an even half a dozen goals whilst Tien Linh is just the single strike back.
The only players with even an outside shot at catching that pair are a trio of Thai players in Adisak Kraisorn, Bordin Phala and Peeradon Chamratsamee but with all three having scored just twice so far it would take a performance for the ages to reel in either of the leading contenders.
That then means it's essentially a straight shootout between the master and the apprentice for the honour of being the best goal scorer at the tournament.
At 34 years of age, this could well be the swan song at the end of a fabulous career for Teerasil but regardless of whether or not he holds off the challenge of Tien Linh his status as one of the all-time greats of Southeast Asian football is already firmly established.
The Golden Boot winner in 2008, 2012, 2016 and 2020, he's also the all-time leading scorer at the AFF Championship and his 25 tournament goals puts him a whopping seven clear of Singapore's Noh Alam Shah.
It's been a truly remarkable career, flooded with goals regardless of the occasion, the location or the opposition.
Moreover, it's a testament to his longevity that when he scored his first AFF Championship goal back in 2008, several of the Vietnamese players he'll likely face in the final had only just started school.
Whilst Thailand have, to a degree, shared the goals around, for Vietnam it's very much been the Tien Linh show.
More than a third of the 14 goals that the Golden Star Warriors have scored so far at the AFF Mitsubishi Electric Cup 2022 have come via the feet or the head of the clinical 25-year-old.
Playing in a side with so much creative talent has certainly helped Tien Linh but his maturation from squad option to key starter has been hugely impressive.
In each of the three group stage matches he started he found himself on the scoresheet and then for good measure he grabbed the two goals that saw Vietnam hold off the challenge of Indonesia in the semi-finals.
There's a real sense that we could be about to see a changing of the guard in coming years at the AFF Championship as Tien Linh tries to hunt down Teerasil's remarkable goal haul but for now the veteran will be trying to hold off the challenge of the up-and-coming Tien Linh.
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