Brisbane coach Michael Voss remains unsure whether troubled star forward Brendan Fevola will play this AFL season.

And he admits the Lions' punt last year on a swag of recycled players - including Fevola - has clearly not paid off so far.

With Fevola still being treated for alcohol and gambling issues, the coach said there was no chance he would return by the start of the premiership season and a big cloud over his entire season.

"The real answer to that is I don't know," Voss said of the two-time Coleman medallist's playing prospects this year.

"There's still a lot of things he's got to be able to do and all I'd say is I wouldn't anticipate seeing him in round one, that's for sure.

"He's got a number of things that he's got to be able to overcome first before he considers playing football."

The forward's 17 games last season was at least more than any of his fellow AFL-experienced recruits Xavier Clarke, Matt Maguire, Andrew Raines, Amon Buchanan and Brent Staker.

Clarke's luckless run has continued after he sustained a serious knee injury in late January.

Voss admitted that recruitment policy deserved to be judged a failure at this stage, although he was hopeful that would change.

"We can definitely say we haven't got out of it what we need to at this point," he told SEN radio.

"But having seen some of the boys' pre-seasons I'm hoping that there's a fair bit out of them to come."

Similarly, he was hopeful the club as a whole could defy expectations, after a dismal 2010 was followed by the loss of Michael Rischitelli and Jared Brennan to Gold Coast, before Fevola and Clarke's troubles.

"I don't know why we're turning up, actually, to be brutally honest, I'm not sure why we would even bother," Voss joked.

"... We've spoken a little bit about Brendan and spoken about some of those other things.

"But the reality is until as a footy club we get to present ourselves on the main stage we can't really answer those questions.

"In some ways we're really done with the talking and it's about being able to get on with it.

"We've made a lot of progressions as a footy team and what we have to do is just wait for that opportunity."

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