West Coast might not have the strongest hand heading into the 2019 NAB AFL Draft, but senior coach Adam Simpson says the club will be doing everything possible to find some diamonds in the rough on November 28.

The Eagles will not enter the draft until round three after it parted ways with selections No.14, 24 and 37 in this year’s draft – along with its first round pick in next year’s ballot – to bring Geelong star Tim Kelly to the club during the trade period.

As a result, West Coast’s first pick will be No.46 and its second and final selection in the draft will be pick No.91.

Simpson told 6PR’s SportsdayWA team that the Eagles were more than comfortable with the scenario.

In fact, he said the club had prepared for it a long time ago.

“I think what we’ve done pretty well as a club over the last three or four years is that we’ve managed to get some youth into the side while being pretty competitive,” Simpson said.

“That’s been a real directive of ours for the last four years, so to trade away a few picks and get someone like Tim into the club, it wasn’t just a 'pull the trigger' type of scenario, it was something we had planned for a little bit.”

“We’ll bat a bit deeper in this year’s draft, but there’ll be something there and we’ll have the rookie draft as well.

“There’s still opportunities. I can’t tell you exactly what (type of player) we’re looking for at the moment – we’re still working through what’s around at pick No.46 – but there’ll be something there.”

While Simpson will be looking to have some more talent at his disposal following the draft, he is also hoping to fine tune elements of the Eagles’ game – specifically its contest work – ahead of season 2020.

However, the senior coach said he was wary of completely reworking a game plan that had helped West Coast qualify for the last five finals series.

“It’s dangerous, pre-season, trying to come up with a different or new way of playing or a new style because if you pull a wrong rein you come a long way back,” Simpson offered.

“We’ve quite often just focused on the fundamentals in pre-season and we won’t change that direction.

“There will be some marginal gains that we will have a go at and we’ll focus on some areas of the game, but it won’t be based on innovation. It will more be based on more just doing the basics.

“Our contest work was erratic at stages (in 2019) – I think our numbers didn’t look too good – but what we looked at still didn’t stack up very well.

"We’ve got to get a bit better at the contest, a bit more consistent with how we defend and keep our high scoring efficiency.”