Gold Coast will intensify their AFL recruiting drive after coach Guy McKenna and head recruiter Scott Clayton scribble down a phantom team for the opening round of 2011 on Friday.

Clayton will brief McKenna in Melbourne regarding talks with uncontracted players and the teenagers he expects to recruit at the November 18 national draft to be held at the Gold Coast Convention Centre.

"We'll look at the names on the board and put our best side up and see what we need," McKenna told AAP.

"There are the blokes we've got now who we are looking at, the uncontracted boys and who is coming and then the guys in the draft.

"We can work out where we are soft and have holes in our side and that's where we are going to have to recruit.

"Out of that and there's nothing in the draft, then we turn around to boys like Nathan (Ablett), Charlie (Dixon), Todd Grayson and (Matt) Fowler and see if there is anyone in the group who can play those positions."

Until now, Clayton has been meeting McKenna on a monthly basis to update him on the recruiting process and his finds in local and under-age leagues.

From Friday the pair will convene fortnightly as they refine their choices.

The Suns can have as many as 58 players - including nine rookies - on their roster in 2011, although McKenna said that many players was almost unmanageable.

Clayton has already stated the Suns are likely to only take eight of a possible 16 uncontracted players under their concessions.

Geelong Brownlow medallist Gary Ablett, Lions midfielder Michael Rischitelli, Western Bulldogs defender Jarrod Harbrow and Adelaide key position player Nathan Bock have all been linked with the Suns.

"Potentially we can have a list of 58 players," said McKenna.

"From a club point of view, from a coaching point of view, the player-coach ratio starts to get blown out of the water.

"There's only so much time and so many coaches and to have a list of 58, you have to be able to service them and justify putting time into then and be convinced they are going to play AFL.

"There's no point, taking punts and hope that two years of development is going to make this bloke make it."

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