The Suns are set to turn to the AFLW draft to enhance their list as opposed to trading

They are seen as a team on the rise but even the Suns have acknowledge they are lacking in some areas.

THE Suns are set to turn to the draft to enhance their AFLW list as the league sign and trade period kicks off on Monday.

The Suns have conceded their inaugural list was too young and while they are still committed to drafting some of Queensland’s brightest talents, the club believes there remains a raft of undiscovered, mature age talent ready to take the next step into the AFLW.

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With the Northern Territory and Townsville officially confirmed as Academy zones, a host of AFLW ready talents could land on the Suns’ doorstep with players who have lived and played in those regions for at least two years able to nominate solely for the Gold Coast region in the AFLW draft.

While the Suns have not ruled out trading for ready-made talent, Head of Women’s Football Fiona McLarty hoped to unearth the next crop of AFLW stars via the draft following the success of mature age selections Jade Pregelj, Hannah Dunn, Kate Surman and Lauren Ahrens.

Lauren Ahrens impressed as a mature age recruit. (Photo by Daniel Carson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

“We’re not looking for anyone as good as and if we’re going to bring anyone in, we want them to make the group better on and off the field,” McLarty said.

“While we still think we have some good talent coming through and that hasn’t been picked up yet but we found we were a little bit young.”

Suns Academy talents Daisy D’Arcy, Maddison Levi and Annie Bradfield lead the race as some of Queensland’s best youth talents but McLarty said the Suns were also scouting what was on offer in the Northern Territory.

Clubs can re-sign 27 players, forcing at least three list changes but it is expected the Suns will make more than the required three changes.

Maddy Roberts is the only confirmed list change so far, stepping away from football to pursue a career with the New South Wales fire and rescue Academy.

McLarty said the pressure was now on the Suns and their list to improve once more following an unexpected finals appearance in their debut season.

“We always wanted to be competitive from day one and making finals demonstrated that,” she said.

“Last year, nobody had any expectations of us but now externally there is an expectation but we’ve also got expectations on ourselves.

“We want long term success, we don’t want to come out and win a premiership within the next two years at any cost and we want to set up the foundations for the future.”