MIDFIELDER Kade Simpson believes the difference between his team in 2005, the last time the Blues made the pre-season Grand Final, and this year, is the influence of youth.

"There's been a big rollover of players and just the youth in the side now, it's excellent," Simpson said following training on Wednesday at MC Labour Park.

"We've got the list we want and it's working well at the moment. We lost a lot of good players with age, but I think there's a lot of talent here now with a lot of high draft picks."

Simpson, only 22 years old himself, had the best season of his short career in 2006, yet he doesn't feel any weight of expectations on his young shoulders as a result.

"I stepped up in the leadership towards the end of last year and it was good to have another crack at it this year," said Simpson.

"I'm always trying to improve and get better as all the boys are. We’ve got to keep improving and hopefully the side will go better."

And according to the 43-gamer, the side's improvement will be given a massive boost if it can win this Saturday night against the Brisbane Lions at Telstra Dome in the 2007 NAB Cup Grand Final.

"We only had three wins last year, so if we could put four wins together in a row and then take that into round one against Richmond it would just be a big bonus for us," the former Eastern Ranges player said.

"Because it's such a young side, just the winning experience would be great for our young fellas."

However, the task of clinching this year's NAB Cup won't be easy with the return of Brisbane's superstar Jonathan Brown and the red-hot form of its midfielders Simon Black and Michael Rischitelli.

"Blacky is an absolute superstar, he's proven that over many years, I'm not sure who we'll put on him. Probably one of the midfielders, in-and-under because, that's where he wins it, in close, " Simpson said.

"Rischitelli is an up-and-coming star. I've watched a couple of their games and he's winning plenty of the ball out of the middle and kicking long to their forwards. We'll probably try and stick to our structure in the middle of the ground and try and just beat them to the ball more."