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ESSENDON is confident of restocking its list with quality prospects when it takes its strongest-ever hand of early picks to this year's NAB AFL Draft.
The Dons pushed up the draft order during the recent NAB AFL Trade Period, and will wield four picks inside the top 25 in Adelaide next month – having added picks No.5, 24 and 25 to their existing fourth selection.
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It will only be the second time since 2010 that the Dons have held picks inside the top 10 – the last being used on father-son recruit Joe Daniher (pick 10 in 2012) – after their sanctions from the supplements saga and the introduction of expansion clubs.
"We are rapt to be in a position where we can get such good players. We have had two years of (draft) sanctions and two years before that we had the new franchises in the competition," list manager Adrian Dodoro told the News Ltd.
"We haven’t had such good picks for a long time. We have picks 24 and 25 as well, so between the four picks, we want to cover both areas.
"We don’t know which way Melbourne will go (at pick No.3) but there are five or six kids there that we would be happy to take two of, and we will spend the next 30 days doing our due diligence and working with the senior coach on our options."
Dodoro said the Bombers would target a range of talls and running types in the draft.
The likes of gun midfielder Darcy Parish (Geelong Falcons), utility Aaron Francis (West Adelaide), Eastern Ranges key forward Sam Weideman and powerful mid/forward Charlie Curnow (Geelong Falcons) could all be in the mix at Essendon's picks.
"In the last two years we had only had two picks in both drafts so we got Zach Merrett, Orazio Fantasia, Kyle Langford and Jayden Laverde," Dodoro said.
"It gives us a chance to add to that and we will get a couple of picks towards the end as well."
The Dons addressed their ruck shortage by recruiting free agent Matthew Leuenberger and added midfield experience via Sydney Swans veteran Craig Bird after losing Jake Carlilse (St Kilda) and Jake Melksham (Melbourne) during the player exchange period.
