Gold Coast coach Guy McKenna believes the AFL’s next club can be playing finals within its third season. Armed with access to 17-year-old players at this year’s national draft and a raft of early picks in next year’s, McKenna said Gold Coast were aiming to reach the finals by 2013, after joining the league in 2011.

“We hope to, yeah,” he told the Seven Network on Sunday.

“With the quality of kids that we’re seeing now this year and next year’s draft with the players coming in, and if we develop them at the rate we think we can…

“There’s a lot of hard work, mind you.

“It’s not just a matter of putting our feet up on the desk saying ‘We’ve got these 21 18-year-olds, how good are we?’, and bringing in that other talent.

“There’s a lot of hard work involved, but we think around that time we’ll be knocking on the door, that’s for sure.”

While the Gold Coast will build their playing list through young talent, McKenna expected the club to chase some seasoned recruits to make an impact when it mattered.

“If we think our window’s going to open up around 2013, 2014 we want players not just getting us into those finals but pushing hard through those finals and helping us win them,” he said.

The Gold Coast reaching the finals in their third season would compare favourably to the six other non-Victorian sides in the competition, which went national in 1987.

West Coast reached the finals in their second season, Adelaide and Port Adelaide both made it in their third years, and Sydney played off in September in their fifth season after relocating from South Melbourne in 1982.

But Brisbane and Fremantle both had to wait until their ninth seasons in the AFL before reaching the finals.

McKenna is no guarantee to lead the Gold Coast into the AFL as his current contract expires in 2010.

But he said he would prefer to stay with the fledgling club even if he was offered senior roles by the likes of North Melbourne and Richmond, who are on the search for new coaches.

“I wouldn’t want to walk away from it,” he said.

“Building it from day one I wouldn’t want to leave it after 12 months, 18 months, that’s for sure.”

© AAP 2012

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