AFL grand final parade 2024 LIVE updates: Qantas engineers threaten action during AFL, NRL grand finals; Bumper crowd as Dons thump Dees

The AFL’s official slogan for this grand final is: “2 stories. 1 ending.” Try selling that to Dane Rampe, or any of the Sydney and Brisbane players who have been to this stage before and didn’t get the ending they wanted.

“What I’ve learned over the last couple of losses I’ve had is that no one cares about your story, really,” Rampe said.

“It would be great for us to get back there and win after ’22. It would 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.”

That slogan rotated through the digital advertising boards at the MCG as the Swans and Lions put the final touches on their preparations with open training sessions on Friday in front of at least 5000 fans – an easy, cruisy stretching of the legs before one of the biggest days of their lives.

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That’s a good day out for Essendon. The Bombers kicked 11 goals to the Demons one to claim a 65-point victory at Windy Hill.

It’s been a while since Essendon fans have gotten to chant “we are Essendon, we are Essendon”.

Daria Bannister kicked four goals for Essendon while teammate Maddy Prespakis finished with 32 touches and a goal.

Melbourne weren’t done any favours by their injury list, which included Tayla Harris, Lauren Pearce and Maeve Chaplin.

They were forced to name two VFLW top-up players as emergencies to be able to field the required team of 24.

Qantas engineers plan to strike in Sydney, coinciding with the NSW school holidays and the lead-up to the NRL grand final, as they step up their fight for better pay.

Many workers will stay at home on Monday as their union pushes for a 15 per cent pay rise in the first year of a new enterprise agreement, followed by 5 per cent each year after that.

On Thursday, strike action by Qantas engineers in Melbourne threatened disruptions ahead of Saturday’s AFL grand final, but the airline said customers weren’t affected.

Qantas says it has contingencies in place for the next round of industrial action taking place at the start of school holidays and days ahead of the NRL grand final on Sunday, October 6.

Australian Workers’ Union national secretary Paul Farrow said there was no “strategy” behind the timing of Monday’s strike, following four months of negotiations. He sympathised with Qantas passengers who might face delays.

“It’s completely understandable but that’s a problem for Qantas, not a problem for our members, because our members only have a window to negotiate their wages and that’s when their agreement expires,” he said on Friday. “Anyone that’s got any frustrations, please take it up with Qantas.”

He described the airline’s offer, of an annual 3 per cent pay rise, as a “slap in the face” particularly after wage freezes and redundancies during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Our members are asked to share the pain when the company’s going through tough times, and they do,” Farrow said. “When the company starts turning around billion dollar profits and the employees say, ‘Well now times are good’ … the response is no.”

Qantas made a net profit of $1.25 billion in the 2023-24 financial year, down 28 per cent from the previous year.

About 1100 aircraft maintenance workers, which is about 45 per cent of the airline’s engineers, are covered by the agreement under negotiation.

No further industrial action is taking place in Melbourne over the long weekend and Qantas said it does not expect any delays or cancellations.

“Qantas customers continue to be unaffected by industrial action from some of our maintenance engineers,” a spokesperson said on Friday.

Some 300,000 people are transiting through airports in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane ahead of the AFL grand final on Saturday, according to the Tourism and Transport Forum.

Victorian Minister for Sport Steve Dimopoulos on Friday said Qantas and Virgin Australia had to put on about 40 extra flights to accommodate passengers travelling from Brisbane and Sydney to Melbourne for the grand final.

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Essendon have held Melbourne to just one goal at three-quarter-time, while piling on eight of their own.

Four have come off the boot of Daria Bannister and two from Ellyse Gamble.

The Bombers are set for just their second win of the year, but it’ll keep their season alive.

Unfortunately for Melbourne, it will leave them 1-5 and a long way from finals contention.

Essendon 8.5 (53) to Melbourne 1.1 (7) early last term.

“Why do you love Aussie rules so much?” is a question I’m often asked. Living in a rugby league city, people are intrigued by my adoration of the game, or more specifically, Sydney.

The assumptions are that I attend games with my husband because he’s a supporter (I take him) or I’m going with my son (he’s a Rabbitohs fans) or I’m originally from Melbourne (nope). Perhaps as a middle-aged mother of two, I don’t fit the footy devotee image people have in their heads (I can assure you there are plenty of us).

The answer is, although I was born in Canberra, both my parents previously lived in Melbourne and my father brought his infectious passion for the game with him when they moved to the nation’s capital. One of my earliest childhood memories is watching my dad wearing a yellow and black jersey, cheering at the television set in 1980 when his beloved Richmond won the premiership flag.

I moved to Sydney in my early 20s and watching the footy fell away to working, partying and making mates. It wasn’t until I’d moved overseas, then returned to Sydney to have my first baby in 2005, that my love of AFL was sparked again. With working, partying and making mates replaced with breastfeeding, settling and nappy changing, a weekly Swans game on the telly broke the humdrum of winter with a newborn.

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Must to the disdain of this hungry journalist, the line for the chips at Windy Hill hasn’t died down all game.

Seems like they didn’t plan for the 4000 fans who have poured into Windy Hill.

In saying that, the atmosphere is great, all under the stunning Melbourne sky.

One Demons fan said: “You can always count on Essendon fans to turn out.” Especially on a good day at Windy Hill, and a good day in particular for Bombers fans, as Essendon have kicked seven goals to Melbourne’s one.

The last came off the boot of Elyse Gamble.

Melburnians Paul McLaughlin and his sister Sharon Phillips’ support for the Lions run a little deeper, having followed the team for about half a century – back when they were the Fitzroy Lions.

“Mum’s 85 or 86 and she used to go take us and the cousins, so she’s followed Fitzroy all her life and so did her parents,” Ms Phillips said.

Mr McLaughlin’s son Ryan and Ms Phillip’s daughter Claire have continued the family tradition.

“When I was born, I wouldn’t say forced, but I wanted to go down that road to Brisbane,” Ryan told AAP.

“So far it’s worked out, which in the early stages it wasn’t, but eventually the success came so I could be more happier.”

The family are big fans of the grand final eve parade and have attended multiple times even when their team wasn’t among the final two.

“It gives crowd interaction with the players, and the footy players seem to respect and appreciate all the crowd turning up, so that’s a bit of fun,” Mr McLaughlin told AAP.

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Essendon fans are up and about at Windy Hill as three early goals from Daria Bannister, plus another from Amber Clarke, have given the Bombers an early 17-point lead against Melbourne.

The Bombers have had a rough start to the year, with just the one win to show from their five games, so the early goals fest is a welcomed sight for the Bomber faithful.

The Dees have just the one goal from the first term, thanks to Ryleigh Wotherspoon.

Essendon 4.0 (24) to Melbourne 1.1 (7), early in the second term.