See all the key quotes as John Longmire and Dane Rampe speak to the media for the final time ahead of the 2024 Toyota AFL Grand Final.

John, the journey you've been on, trying to climb the mountain again after 2012. Do you feel like this is the best you've been placed throughout this journey?

Well, I mean, you go through different experiences. Both clubs go through different experiences. We know that that doesn't give you the right though.

You've still got to earn it. And so, both teams will be trying to do that. It's regardless of what's happened in the past, it's about tomorrow now.

And, you know, we know that you've still got to go out there and do your job and you've got to earn it regardless of anyone's story leading up to it. The job's got to be done. And, you know, you sit here and obviously everyone's not sure about how it will unfold, but we've just got to focus on that tomorrow, doing our jobs and coming in early and ready to go.

And that's all you can really focus on.

John, how tough was the decision and the conversation with Callum?

 Yeah, it's tough. It's one of those things you've got to make decisions, you sit down as a group of medical conditioning staff and you go through everything and you talk about it and then you've got to deliver the message. It's tough because Callum’s a great person and a great leader of our footy club, but he also understands that decisions need to be made and then jobs need to be done after that.

He came down, obviously, with us yesterday and he's absolutely behind the team, ready to go and that's just the sort of person he is. He's a wonderful person.

How did he react when you told him?

As you'd imagine.

I probably don't need to describe it. He was disappointed, but that's what happens sometimes when we weight it all up. The risks going into a game like this just seem to outweigh and go against Callum in that moment, even though he trained well.

We had that discussion as a group, made that decision as a group and then we get on with things.

Ramps it a bit of sweat for you taking over Callum's job? Do you have to prepare yourself differently now going into a grand final or is it the same sort of preparation for you?

It's a good question, mate. I think bit of sweat is exactly the word. First of all, shout out for a mate, one of my great mates and leaders of our club that we've been through a lot together with. So yeah, we've had to push that aside.

Me and him had a cry after the and business as usual and that's what it had to be. As for my prep, I don't think anything changes. I've been doing what I can in terms of a leadership sense all year and nothing for me changes.

I'll be going out and doing what I need to do and yeah, that's it.

John, losing your captain for a big chunk of the season and then on the eve of the grand final, a lot of teams, that would be a huge blow. It's obviously a big decision to make for the club, but can you talk to the player leadership group? It seems that Sydney has coped with that remarkably well this year.

Yeah, look, first of all, he's a very good player. He's obviously a top-line player, but we've played most of the season without him.

We've played the Preliminary final without him. We've got a strong core group of players, whether it's Dane or some of the other more experienced players. Those guys that have been around a bit. But it's also our younger guys.

Our younger guys have played a bit of footy together now, and so they've been taking the responsibility as well. It's not just the more mature, older guys in our group. We rely upon our younger group as well, coming through, who are able to lead in their own way.

Sometimes that's in a bit of a different way, but we've found that really beneficial this year, that those guys have been able to do what they need to do. That impacts the team in a really positive way. It's about our whole team, not just the older leaders, and that's what we've been really happy with.

John, just on the theme of ruckman, I just wanted to ask you about Brodie Grundy. Has he had to do some furious scouting on Darcy Fort this week, and also just talking about Brodie coming to the club and what a difference he's made.

Yeah, look, he's done some work clearly. He's a professional. When he comes into his preparation he and Cox have been working on that as well as Hayden and looking at what he's been doing.

He's a very good player. So we've done a bit of work on him. Brodie, it's a wonderful journey for him, but he's had different experiences over the years.

I guess that's part of what you do when you go into grand finals is everyone's got their own storyline from both teams. Brodie's got his and it's quite a unique one. But we know tomorrow, the first bounce and when they're standing opposite of each other, storylines go out the window.

It's time to get the job done and that's really what it gets down to.

Dane, you're coming up to your fourth grand final. What have you learned from the last three and does that prior experience kind of take away a few of the nerves going into tomorrow?

Yeah, it probably does. I mean, I've experienced the worst, let's be honest. So there's a little bit of peace knowing I've experienced that and been able to work through that and get back here.

What I've learned probably over the couple of losses that I had is that no one cares about your story really. It'd be great for us to, I guess, get back there and win after 22. It'd be great for Brisbane to get back and make amends for last year.

But they don't care about our story and we don't care about theirs and that's the way it is. So we have to go out there and make it happen ourselves and yeah, that's probably the main thing I've learned.