There’s every chance Lance Franklin wouldn’t be on the cusp of his 300^th AFL match if it wasn’t for two blue streaks of paint on a big tin shed. 

It was on a wheat farm in Dowerin, a town 156 kilometres north-east of Perth, that a young Buddy began to build himself into the AFL superstar he’d become. 

Hardly a day would pass that at least one of his four older sisters wouldn’t join him for a kick of the footy, and while they’d rarely have the energy to spend as many hours in the backyard as Lance, their brother always had the shed.

Lance’s father, Lance snr, one day pulled out a paintbrush and gave his son a gift that inspired the gifted, splotching goalposts on the family’s enormous shearing shed.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

It’s a sound chiselled into the memory of Lance’s sister Bianca.

“I just remember the sound of the ball hitting the tin shed. Boom, boom, boom, goal after goal after goal. I can’t tell you how many times that ball hit the shed. He just loved it,” Bianca said.

“And the running commentary! You could hear him. He’s running, he’s the chasing the ball, he’s picked it up on the wing and he’s gone for a goal! The running commentary was really quite amusing.

“Me and my younger sister – we used to kick the ball with him every day. But because he just had so much energy he’d wear us down and always end up kicking on his own. If Buddy had no one to kick with he could practice his goal-kicking against the shed. Once I tapped out and my younger sister tapped out, he’d go and kick the ball against the shed – and he’d do it for hours and hours on end.

“We used to kick the footy together every day. Back in those days there were no iPhones or iPads or YouTube, so you were forced to go outside. And mum and dad never let us just stay inside all day and watch TV. They always made us get outside and get some fresh air and kick the ball around and shoot the basketball or netball.”

Lance’s eldest sister is Katherine, and Rechelle, Bianca and Bree all follow.

Every one of his sisters, as well as father Lance snr and mother Urshula, will be in the SCG stands for Saturday’s milestone match.

When Lance runs out to face St Kilda in Sydney’s last game of season 2019, the 32-year-old will become just the 89^th player in VFL/AFL history to have reached 300 matches. 

And he’s pieced together a resume rivalled by few on the road to the triple century.

Lance is a dual premiership player, eight-time All Australian and four-time Coleman medallist, while he’s booted 940 goals to be placed seventh on the all-time goal-kicking leaderboard. 

Bianca has an overwhelming sense of pride for her star younger brother.

“I know how much this milestone means to him, and for him to finally get there is such an amazing achievement,” Bianca said.

“Just from watching him play since he was a young kid, I know he was always destined to play AFL. It’s all he’s known and it’s all he loves to do, so to see him go out there and play with so much passion and love – I’m incredibly proud.

“Getting to 300 games is an amazing achievement.”