CRAIG Starcevich was blown away by Brisbane's return to full-time training on Monday, saying the next decade could be as successful as the first nine seasons for his Lions.
Coming off a Grand Final loss to North Melbourne in December, Starcevich – who has extended his contract to the end of 2026 – said the first indications are positive about his team's response to the defeat.
Almost half the team ran personal bests in Monday's 2km time trial, with Orla O'Dwyer setting a club record and leaders Bre Koenen, Ally Anderson and Nat Grider all notching lifetime bests.
"The hardest thing to do is when they lose the last game of the year, you've got to wait seven months before you can get some sort of atonement," Starcevich said.
"The proof is the very first session back when you check out how fit they are and how clean they are with their skills and both those areas blew us away.
"Their time trial results were extraordinarily good and their concentration and cleanliness with the ball were super afterwards.
"That's a great start. That's our only bit of proof, but it's a good start."
The Kangaroos set a new benchmark in 2024, flipping the result from the previous year's Grand Final, where the Lions won their second AFLW flag.
Despite losing heavily to the same opponent twice last year, Starcevich believes the difference between the teams is not that great.
"On paper, if you're looking from the outside, you'd say the two results they had against us last year there looks like there's a bit of a gap," he said.
"There were lots of phases in the Grand Final where we were in the game and just didn't score, so we didn't get the chance to put them under any sort of pressure.
"Kudos to the way they handled the day. I think it's pretty exciting.
"We've got two pretty good teams that have played the last two (Grand Finals) against each other, it's one-all.
'We know what we need to fix, they probably want to keep improving. There's a bit pack underneath chasing us. The competition is in a very healthy condition."
Starcevich believes his team will have more depth than ever in 2025, saying there's genuine competition for positions.
"I'm really excited about the group of people we've bought in over the past two drafts," he said.
"Our least experienced 10 players are exciting, they just haven't had a whole lot of opportunity yet.
"While we've been pretty successful over the nine seasons so far, the next four, five, 10 years could be even more exciting and more successful."
