CARLTON’s AFLW pre-season officially kicks off on Monday and the girls are raring to go.

With nine new players arriving at Ikon Park over the off-season Bluebaggers will get their first look at the 2020 squad.

General Manager of Women’s Football Ash Brown outlined what the playing group can expect from the first stage pre-season when speaking to Carlton Media.

“Our first stage of pre-season is hopefully building a really good solid fitness base with the players: it hopefully ensures that we can have the majority of our list get through most of the pre-season sessions before Christmas,” Brown said.

“Hopefully that’s going to set us up to have a really good solid pre-season, but also have a really good platform to move into our practice games.”

An interactive fixture?



Now that's something everyone can enjoy.



Take a closer click through our 2020 fixture! #BoundByBlue — Carlton Womens (@carltonfc_w) October 29, 2019

The first point of call for the returning players will be next weekend’s pre-season camp, which is something Brown believes will assist in bonding the group.

“With nine players departing our last year we’ve obviously got quite a turnover there, so we’re using the camp as an opportunity to hopefully bond, develop relationships within the playing group but also the staff group as well,” he said.

“It’ll be a great opportunity for us to spend plenty of time together on camp, get to know each other and also work on some of our game-plan aspects and values.”

With seven new draftees and two rookies arriving at Ikon Park, there are plenty of new faces in Navy Blue ahead of the 2020 season.

After reaching a Grand Final in 2019, Brown believes the new additions will reinvigorate the group to reach greater heights this season.

“Having that new group come through just adds an enormous amount of energy, enthusiasm and positivity about the season,” he said.

“The pleasing thing is out of that group of nine players, about half of those players have played VFL football before and are mature-age recruits.

“We feel like we’ve got a really good blend of experience within that group of nine players that are new coming into our club.”