In contrast to the scenes of jubilation from the Port Adelaide players at AAMI Stadium the previous evening, it was a far more subdued celebration at the MCG immediately following Saturday night's hard-fought nine-point preliminary-final win over Geelong.
Nevertheless, Matthews indicated the Lions are cherishing their opportunity to again be playing off for the trophy next weekend.
"No one should be ever thinking that we're taking it for granted. Every time you come to a preliminary final, or a grand final for that matter, it might well be the last time you ever will," Matthews said after the match.
"I guess for us, the euphoria of getting into the grand final, for the fourth time, isn't not quite the same as for Port last night."
"They (Port Adelaide) have made their first grand final. That doesn't make any difference to next Saturday but to make their first grand final, for them is a greater surge of adrenalin probably than getting into another grand final."
"At the moment I don't think we feel like we're grand finalists, I feel like we're still alive and down to the last two."
On the match, Matthews said the tight contest had no defining moment but thought the Lions did well to make the most of their opportunities going forward.
"They were always going to be tough. They dominated the forward entries but we were able to hold them to 10.15, they helped us by missing a few and we scunged out 12.12."
"We missed a few as well but we certainly had to score really well from a limited number of times in our forward 50."
"We're normally very high in our inside 50s but tonight we were very low. To kick 12.12 from only 40 in, 40 is a very minimal amount of entries for us."
