By Lucy Cormack and Tim O'Connor
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LIKE many local footballers, former North Ballarat Rebel Jake Lloyd dreamt of hitting the big league.
But even he finds it hard to believe this week he will play in the AFL grand final.
At the start of the year, all the former Horsham Demons player wanted was to play one senior game of football. So just days out from running out in a grand final with the Sydney Swans, it seems his dream has come true - and then some.
"When I got that opportunity in round five, I guess that's all it was, an opportunity," he said.
"I just wanted to grab it with both hands and I've been able to do that."
Since charging into the senior side in round five, Lloyd has appeared in 16 successive games - only one of which has ended in a Sydney defeat, the round 18 nail-biter against Hawthorn, which the Swans take on in Saturday's decider.
Playing for a premiership in his first season of AFL at just 21, Lloyd has given a good name to the talent on offer in the rookie draft, in which he was selected in 2012.
It was this year that saw him move from Horsham to Ballarat and take up work at Coronet Laundry while playing a second season - as a 19-year-old - for the Rebels.
Like 2011, he missed selection in the national draft, but this time was later picked up by the Swans as a rookie.
Lloyd said seeing West Coast's Matt Priddis (a rookie in 2006) win the Brownlow Medal on Monday night was testament to a rookie's ability to shine.
"It was great to see him win that award last night," Lloyd said.
"Even in our side from Saturday there are a lot of guys that have come from other clubs that have been on a rookie list. It certainly shows, if you work hard enough you'll get there."
But now he has got there, Lloyd said he was just starting to understand the scale of the grand final experience, describing the media pack at an open training session as "surreal".
For Lloyd, playing alongside star Lance Franklin is a thrill.
"In our semi-final against Fremantle, he pulled a couple of goals from nowhere and it was very exciting for the boys," he said.
"He certainly gets everyone up and about. He's going to be a special player come Saturday."
Lloyd has come a long way from the two national drafts in which he was overlooked, but said the hard work was paying off.
"I guess its how hard you really want to work," he said.
"I'm just grateful for the opportunity. I guess I wanted to show them that I belonged here. To be 21 and playing in the grand final, I'm very fortunate, but I've certainly worked hard, so it's a good reward."
One man that knows Lloyd well is North Ballarat Rebels talent manager Phil Partington.
Partington said Lloyd had one of the highest work rates of any player he has seen come through the club's system.
"Jake, through his basketball background, had a fantastic game sense," Partington said.
"He's a very smart footballer, knows when to run, when to conserve energy and when not to conserve energy and is very smart at reading the play."
Partington said Lloyd was a "determined and dogged sort of fellow" and admitted that Sydney had shown interest in Lloyd throughout his 2012 Rebels season before eventually drafting him.