It's the aftermath of an AFL grand final, and in the losing team's rooms it's quiet like a museum.
An exciting team from outside Victoria and filled with young talent has made the decider a year or two earlier than expected, and been demolished by an untouchable Geelong outfit, who have broken a more than decade-long wait for a flag.
The shell-shocked players are devastated, being comforted by friends and families, their premiership dreams in tatters.
Sounds familiar — but the year is 2007, and the devastated team is Port Adelaide after being trounced by a record 119-point margin by the Cats.
Fast forward 15 years, and the Sydney Swans are in similar territory — and peril — after failing to fire a shot against a rampant Geelong side in the biggest game of the season.
The brilliant second-half of the 2022 season saw the Swans raise their performance level and overcome a series of rivals for the top-eight, to give the impression they would give the premiership an almighty crack.
The buzz grew about John Longmire's men, as Sydney's young brigade provided the lift from people like Nick Blakey, Tom Papley, Errol Gulden, James Rowbottom, Chad Warner, Dylan Stephens, Justin McInerney and Tom McCartin.
They ended Collingwood's fairytale run in an epic preliminary final at the SCG, and went into grand final week expecting to test Chris Scott's mighty Geelong side.
Instead, it proved to be the Swans' grand final horribilis, reminiscent of the shocking end to Port Adelaide's season in 2007.
That year, Port Adelaide finished second on the ladder, three games behind Geelong.
It wasn't a complete like-for-like situation for the Power, who had won the flag three years previously.
There were 11 of the flag-winning grand final 22 from 2004 on the field against Geelong.
The Power had won nine out of 10 matches leading into the 2007 grand final, close to the Swans who went into this year's decider on a nine-match winning streak.
The Cats in 2007 were in outstanding form, having won 18 out of 19 matches leading into the grand final, and were deserved hot favourites.
Geelong jumped the Power, kicking 5.7 to 2.2 in an opening quarter, and things went downhill from there for Port Adelaide.
The margin was 52 points by half-time, a whopping 90 points with a quarter to go, and there was no let up in the final term, as a demoralised Port Adelaide managed 1.3 to the Cats' 6.2.
Port Adelaide had a number of players in their late 20s and 30s like ruckman Brendon Lade, defender Darryl Wakelin, full-forward Warren Tredrea, midfielder Peter Burgoyne and forward Toby Thurstans, together with a group of younger players who had combined to push the Power to a grand final.
Some of the younger ones kicked on — Travis Boak would go on to be skipper of Port Adelaide, Kane Cornes played 300 games for the Power, Justin Westhoff played 280 games and kicked 313 goals in teal and black.
Shaun Burgoyne would become an AFL great, making it past 400 games and finishing with four flags after 12 seasons at Hawthorn and Danyle Pearce and Troy Chaplin had several seasons at Fremantle and Richmond after leaving Port Adelaide.
But the promise of the young generation to take the Power onwards did not eventuate, and it was a largely different group that took Port back to the finals.
Like the Power, the Swans had an almost complete inability to make headway against the Cats on the big stage.
In 2007, Geelong had 69 inside 50s to the Power's 38, and 43 scoring shots to Port Adelaide's 14.
On Saturday afternoon at the MCG, Geelong had 65 forward 50 entries to just 32 for Sydney. The Swans had averaged 55 inside 50s in their 24 games for the year before the grand final.
The Cats kicked 20 goals and had 33 scoring shots to Sydney's eight goals and 12 scoring shots.
It may not have been quite on the level of the Power's loss in 2007, but it was the equal-fifth biggest margin in VFL-AFL grand final history.
The game was all but over after one quarter, and it should have been done and dusted — the Cats piled on six goals to one but the quarter-time score was 6.5 - 1.0.
The Swans managed to hold the line somehow in the second term, to trail by 36 points at the long break. But they were struggling to hit their targets, getting smashed in contested possessions, with a mounting turnover tally and an inability to make an impact against the Cats' back six. And worse was to come.
The gamble on Sam Reid's fitness failed. The key ruck-forward had to be subbed out in the third term.
The Swans' best hope of victory had been to bring their trademark manic pressure, force the Cats into errors and hit them on the counter.
Instead it was Sydney's players who were rattled, as Geelong racked up the marks around the ground, and cut the Swans to pieces with 17 marks inside 50 for the game.
While Swans greats like Michael O'Loughlin could hardly watch from the grandstand, Sydney could not mount a charge.
Afterwards, Dane Rampe made a gracious speech on the ground — paying tribute to the victors and singling out the winning skipper and finals record-breaker Joel Selwood.
His co-captain Callum Mills could not hide the pain when facing the media in the rooms after a game where he spent most of his time trying to put out fires instead of damaging the Cats.
He rejected suggestions the young brigade had been overwhelmed by the occasion.
"Definitely not the young players, I think we as leaders take ownership of that performance and we weren't at the standard of what we needed to be on grand final day," Mills said.
"It's shattering to be honest. A lot went wrong today and … to Geelong's credit they were really good."
What happens next?
A year on from their MCG horror show, the Power finished with just seven wins and missed the finals. In the last game of their year, only 14 members of the previous year's grand final side ran out against North Melbourne.
The Power finished 13th in 2008, then 10th in 2009 and 10th again in 2010.
They made the finals again in 2013, in Ken Hinkley's first season. Fifteen years on from their record loss, the Power have not got back to a grand final since.
There's no suggestion it will take six years for Sydney to return to finals or 15 years to make the grand final after this loss.
The 2022 season was a brilliant one for the Swans, who thrilled fans and pundits alike with their mix of traditional Sydney grit, skill and irrepressible attack.
But there are no guarantees in football.
Lance Franklin has one more season left in the Harbour City. Luke Parker turns 30 in a little over a month. Reid has played a crucial role in Sydney's finals run — but he will be 31 by the time the next season starts.
Rampe is now 32 and will turn 33 during next season.
Also in defence, Jake Lloyd turned 29 in grand final week while Robbie Fox, who along with Warner was one of the few Swans not to have his colours lowered, will turn 30 next year.
Again, there is nothing to suggest terminal decline — far from it.
But it's fair after a loss like this to look at some recent Sydney history.
The Swans are known for their professionalism, their culture, their never-say-die attitude and their fierce pressure.
Their first grand final as Sydney was a disappointing 43-point loss to North Melbourne, but then three frantic, classic deciders in eight seasons were decided by a total of 15 points, confirming the image of the Swans.
Now, however, as good and as consistent as Sydney has been over the past two decades, it has to be noted that their last three grand finals have all been losses, by a combined margin of 166 points.
Put another way, those three games have had an average losing margin of a tick over nine goals.
That needs to improve.
No doubt John Longmire will believe that the Swans have the cattle and the gamestyle to bounce back and make a renewed top-four or even top-two charge in 2023.
There will clearly be a burning desire among the playing group to make amends — to the club, to themselves and to the fans.
But depending on what happens in trade period, the likes of Collingwood and Melbourne — and Geelong — are likely to strengthen their line-ups and squads.
For Longmire and his men, the key for them in 2023 may well be to ensure that they stay in the premiership race and do not allow the effects of such a damaging grand final loss from lingering and potentially setting back the new Swans project for years.
