The Gold Coast SUNS appear set to make a few changes to its side to tackle Brisbane in Townsville on Sunday. 

Karmichael Hunt will return after a bout of gastro, while  Harley Bennell, Rory Thompson, Seb Tap and Luke Russell could all play their first matches of the pre-season.

After winning its first NAB Challenge match against Essendon by one point on Monday night at Metricon Stadium, Gold Coast coach Guy McKenna flagged he would rest some key personnel from the match against the Lions.

Gary Ablett, Michael Rischitelli, Jaeger O'Meara and David Swallow were those singled out by the coach as being set to be rested from the trip to North Queensland.

Brisbane Lions vice captain, Tom Rockliff said those outs made little difference to the Lions.

"It's similar to what we did last week," he said.

"It's still a fair way until round one. They don't want to travel too much and being an interstate team you end up travelling 10, 11 times a year, and you want to go into round one fresh … so we thought they might rest a few.

"There's a chance we might be a bit rusty, and it'll be humid up there and a bit slippery but we've got to get out there and play the best footy we can with the team we field."

The Lions will welcome at least 10 senior players back after last Thursday's 131-point loss against Hawthorn when they travel to Townsville to take on the GC SUNS.

Rockliff, along with captain Jed Adcock, Matthew Leuenberger, Pearce Hanley, Daniel Rich, Joel Patfull, Daniel Merrett, Brent Moloney, Jack Redden and Luke McGuane will be among the inclusions.

Rockliff said although an inexperienced team learnt plenty of lessons against the reigning premier last week, it was time to implement new coach Justin Leppitsch's game-plan with a near full squad.

"Justin mentioned to the guys this will be a near round one team this weekend," Rockliff said after a skills session in the sweltering Brisbane heat on Tuesday morning.

"I don't think the outcome is all that important during the pre-season. You want to have a few wins, we won the pre-season competition last year and came out in round one and got belted."

Jonathan Brown (foot) is still unavailable and is expected to re-join the main group on Thursday, while Ash McGrath (calf) and Brent Staker (calf) also have slight niggles.