THE AFL's 17th team could make its debut as early as next season, with the fledgling side created to win support on the Gold Coast via the state-based QAFL competition.

The creation of the historic new team will move one step closer to reality this week when executive Gillon McLachlan and a strategy team including football operations chief Adrian Anderson meet for the first time to launch a recruitment plan.

While AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou yesterday denied the league was planning an all-out raid on leading players from the 16 existing clubs, it is believed the AFL will look at methods of choosing players through the draft, rookie draft and teenage academy system.

The tender process for the 17th AFL licence will be announced next month, with the Gold Coast-based Southport Sharks certain to put forward a bid.

A bid committee to be chaired by Gold Coast lawyer and community leader John Witheriff and also including Southport chairman Alan MacKenzie and former Brisbane Lions chairman Graeme Downie have advised against private ownership and pushed for a members-based club. While Demetriou would not rule out plucking top players from existing club lists, he stressed such a move would be "counterproductive".

With several clubs still smarting at not being briefed before chairman Mike Fitzpatrick's 2012 bombshell, as revealed in The Age on Saturday, Demetriou said the clubs always had been aware of the competition's broad plan.

"A lot of preparation and lead-in time has already transpired and now we need to demonstrate to our clubs that the impact on them will be minimal and in fact see definite benefits to our clubs," Demetriou said.

"Do we wait and wait and wait? I don't think we can afford to wait … One of the negative consequences of waiting is that we will miss a great opportunity.

"If you really want to be a national competition and place your national footprint in these markets, you need to be there. When is ready? What is ready? What are the key performance indicators to use as a guide?"

Demetriou denied the AFL had declared war on rugby league by bringing forward its plans to launch a team in western Sydney, although he took the opportunity to stress that Australian football was the oldest in the world and was celebrating its 150th birthday in 2008 while the rugby league code was 100 years old this year.

Speaking after commission talks that also included a briefing from former Victorian Supreme Court Justice William Gillard into West Coast, Demetriou said the AFL had learned from the mistakes of the Brisbane Bears and that the game was wealthier, better resourced and had no choice but to speed up the process. "We discussed at length our chairman's desire and our desire to push on into the Gold Coast and western Sydney. It's not a bluff or a scare tactic. We are deadly serious about expanding our competition," he said.

While Demetriou played down the clubs' response to the Fitzpatrick revelations, several clubs yesterday continued to seize at again being uninformed as to the league's plans — plans that AFL bosses outlined to its three broadcast partners, along with the Nine Network late last year.

Hawthorn chairman Jeff Kennett has been particularly vocal about the AFL's lack of communication, while Swans chairman Richard Colless continued unofficially to push the Sydney position that 2012 was far too early to launch a second team into Sydney.

While Demetriou pointed to the AFL's international expansion plans as one day providing a significant talent pool for the expanded competition, he did not support player-manager Ricky Nixon's push to create a national recruiting network in Ireland, stressing that, at best, one in five Gaelic football recruits actually made the grade in the AFL.