George Best- the peerless genius. Football's finest of them all.

George Best- the peerless genius. Football's finest of them all.

Tonight on BBC 2 an hour and half long tribute will be made to one of the greatest footballers Britain has ever produced. It will be a revealing and sensitive profile on a life that was tragically cut short and never really blossomed until it was too late. Of course George Best was arguably one of the best players the world has ever seen, a peerless genius who treated a football with all the grace, care and tenderness of a much loved family friend, always inquiring about its welfare and always trusting that it would respond both warmly and favourably to its gentle requests. Sometimes the ball would sit up co-operatively and then do whatever Best told it to.

For the best part of just over a decade, George Best was one of British football's finest, silkiest, stylish, thoughtful, provocative and pioneering of players. Throughout the 1960s Britain had wit, humour, remarkable creativity, art, positive thinking, fashionable flair, energy, electricity and ambitious idealism. George Best was all of the above with a hugely marketable and natural talent that never faded.

When Best passed away 12 years ago the shock waves could be felt in those far distant corners of the world compass where Best had left his indelible legacy. Best's back story has now been well documented and the details are grotesquely gory now but even now the sadness and poignancy of his passing may never dissolve. The questions may never be answered and the memories will always be fondly cherished.

The horribly incurable alcoholic that Best would become and the self destructive tendencies that so terribly hastened his death, were the inevitable forerunner to a much more fatal disease. If only he'd allowed himself to be guided, loved, needed, coaxed and cajoled by Sir Matt Busby, the man who became Best's father figure but then gave up when Best simply gave up, surrendered and couldn't find his way out of that nightmarishly complex maze.

But with the benefit of hindsight Best will now be a cautionary tale and glaring warning to a modern generation that have now thankfully heeded the lessons of that debauched 1960s past and turned instead to healthier diets and abundant bottles of water during a break in matches. It is hard to believe that one man could so crumble helplessly into a world of hellish, playboy hedonism, complete self indulgence and a freefall into the dirtiest gutter.

Sadly George Best was always the very much the self styled exhibitionist, a fiercely independent spirit who was simply gripped by drink and the distracting company of young girls. In the end it all became too much for Best, engulfed and simply claimed by the demons, the excess, the temptations, the vices, the late nights out, the bleary eyed mornings when clarity became impossible and alcohol became just another part of his footballing vocabulary.

Best though of course still had it all. There was the indefinably beautiful ball control, the close control, the sorcery, the trickery, the feline flexibility, the impishness, the delicate soft shoe shuffles, the shimmies and wriggles, the devious feints, the side steps, the drag backs years before Johan Cruyff, those wonderful moments of delicate dexterity when there would be a sharp intake of breath. George Best transformed, shaped, moulded, reformed a game that might have been beyond salvation. Then sorrowfully and heartbreakingly it all unravelled and the dancing days were well and truly over.

He was cunning, cute, dashing, darting, insufferable, witty, wise, whimsical and immensely skilful. He caught the mood of his generation, constructed his own very private world and, for much of his career, was, for all his wayward extravagances, essentially shy, modest and self deprecating. Above all though Best was a classical striker, midfielder and the wiliest of wingers. He would dart and prowl with intent, carrying the ball with almost ridiculous ease, juggling with the ball in full flight, slaloming past defenders as if they were apparitions and then scoring quite breathtakingly.

The images were supremely magical and endless. There was the moment in an early 1970s match when Manchester United, in full flower, faced a Spurs side that had Pat Jennings, a goalkeeper with enormous hands, superb positional sense and a genuine command of his penalty area. Jennings was both athletic and agile but on an unforgettable day at Old Trafford Jennings could only bow down in admiration at his opponent.

In splendid isolation on the six yard box, Best seemed to stop for what seemed an age. Trapping the ball with his instep, Best looked up, surveyed his options, did a quick piece of land management, stunned the ball and then lobbed the ball over Jennings head as if Jennings was not there. It was quite the most sublime goal and none could have executed the movement with such perfect precision. In fact it was a case of precision engineering with a lovely twist. You were reminded of  a seasoned golfer chipping a ball into the 18th hole of the Open from the roughest of fairways.

Then there was the moment when Best literally taunted and mocked and humiliated West Ham full back John Mcdowell who must have thought he was  deliberately ridiculing him, poking his tongue at Mcdowell, undermining his intelligence. Best turned and twisted from the edge of the penalty area, before arrowing his way into the area of danger, cutting back once again before slamming the ball into the West Ham net. It was a moment of pure, untarnished brilliance, a footballing gem that shone lustrously like the brightest ruby or emerald.

None would forget that fantastic exhibition season at Fulham when Best teamed up with the similarly impudent Rodney Marsh, both men displaying the full range of their showmanship, the sheer splendour of their ostentatious skills. How the Fulham fans marvelled at their fortune that season. But it would only last for the briefest period of time which is more or less where George Best came in.

Best, inexplicably quit the game at the age of 27 and there was an almost shattering sense of anti climax about it all that seemed wretchedly unfair. How dare this master manipulator of a ball retire from football when quite clearly there were so many bountiful days in front of him? Why couldn't Sir Matt Busby or Wilf McGuinness or even Frank O' Farrell have been more persuasive. In fact why couldn't  they go down on their hands and knees and beg Best to change his mind? It seemed a travesty of justice that Best would never appear at a World Cup or European Championship.

Much to the delight of all us though Best did have his glittering night on the biggest stage of all. It was the one night when he was somehow fated to be the star attraction. In 1968 Manchester United faced the massively talented Benfica, a side singularly conducted by the equally as gifted Eusebio at the old Wembley Stadium. It was the European Cup Final and Best was about to become the red-shirted emperor with a Midas touch.

With the lights shining brightly in the Wembley corporate boxes, Best illuminated Wembley with the kind of display that United fans could only have fantasised about after the Munich air disaster in 1958. Now Best took over the game, body swerving daringly and voluptuously, snakelike hips slithering through the undergrowth of the Benfica defence. That night Best had a royal command performance before United's breathless fans, eventually rounding the Benfica keeper for one of  United's winning goals in quite the most astonishing extra time of any European Cup Final.

But oh so calamitously the champagne went sour, the lights went out, the drink simply drowning and overwhelming this Irish imp. It was the most appalling fall from grace for any sportsman and eventually it all went haywire, the alcoholic debauchery strangling and choking him cruelly. Of course there was the game where Best once took off his boot and still performed miracles with a football, of course there was the occasion when a hotel chambermaid, opening his bedroom door, found Best sprawled out on his bed with substantial amounts of money, a Miss World and wondering where it all went wrong.

In the cold light of day George Best will always have a comfortable place in any world class footballing hall of fame. He was confident, deliciously imaginative, shamelessly flamboyant, a player with perfect co-ordination, balance, quick, fleet footed, capricious, a footballing wizard. It hardly seems like 12 years since his passing but Best will always have a place in the hearts of those who witnessed him at his peak. Never has the surname of one man been so apt and fitting. We'll always miss you Bestie.