Huddersfield Town stand at crossroads as supporters brace for Wembley's emotional rollercoaster

Excitement and anxiety are so closely related because the cause of so often the same: uncertainty. The future is never written, but a lot of the time we go through our lives knowing that tomorrow will be more or less the same as today. Days like this, though, send us through a cycle of nerves, excitement, anxiety, anticipation, edginess and mania because there is no way of knowing what tomorrow will look like for Huddersfield Town.

This time, at least, the fans and club have a better idea of what might await in the Premier League; but there were an awful lot of harsh lessons to learn last time they were there, and there may be some apprehension over whether they are now equipped to take those lessons to heart. That is a discussion, hopefully, for another day.

And if another season of Championship football awaits…that wouldn’t be so bad. Carlos Corberan has led this side to an excellent campaign, and restored hope that Town can compete at the correct end of the table next season too. Another season like this one would help quickly erase the agony of final defeat, just as it did ten years ago.

These two roads diverge at Wembley, and those who joke on social media that they would like for Town to win the final but not go up will be sorry they cannot travel both. And that is the crux of the issue, right there: there’s no deferring this decision. It all comes down to today. And it’s the not knowing that will run us emotionally ragged throughout the day, until that final whistle blows to unleash a wave of either sheer ecstasy or resigned defeat.

Because really, although we can talk entirely truthfully and accurately about how being in the Premier League might not be all that fun or how they’ve had a brilliant Championship