FORMER Gold Coast football manager Marcus Ashcroft will take on a role in the AFL's football operations team after departing the Suns last year.

Ashcroft was part of a raft of changes at Gold Coast last season, which saw the club replace coach Rodney Eade and inaugural list manager Scott Clayton.

But the three-time Brisbane Lions premiership player will not be out of football long, having been appointed to a position in the League's talent team. 

AFL.com.au understands Ashcroft will start in the position next Monday, replacing former national talent football manager Mick Ablett, who left the AFL this month after six years to be the talent manager for the WAFL Colts competition.

Ashcroft will work closely with the NAB AFL Academy and its programs, as well as state talent managers from across the country during the annual under-16 and under-18 championships. 

In the role he will also link back up with Lions premiership teammate Luke Power, who is coach of the Academy and recently guided 30 of this year's leading draft prospects on a high performance training camp in America.

Ashcroft started at the Suns as an assistant coach in 2008 before being promoted to the football manager role the following year. 

He was part of the panel that appointed new Suns coach Stuart Dew after Eade was sacked in August last year. 

In another appointment at the AFL, former Geelong and Adelaide forward James Podsiadly has been named the stakeholder and engagement manager in the football operations unit.