SO MUCH has been written and said about Gold Coast in the lead-up to the club's AFL debut, but Andrew Carrazzo says Carlton has not, and will not, make the mistake of buying into the hype around Saturday night's historic clash.

The emotion associated with a new club's first steps onto the big stage saw Adelaide, West Coast and the Brisbane Bears record upset victories on debut, but Carrazzo says the Blues haven't fallen into the trap of concentrating on the new kids on the block at the expense of their own preparation.

"We just did our normal game preparation and opposition review - nothing out of the ordinary," Carrazzo said from Melbourne airport on Friday.

"It's going to be more to do with how we play than what we can expect from them. That will be our thought [process] going into the game.

"Every game comes with pressure now. Every game is almost like an eight-point game the way it's going to be tight at the top this year. There's no added pressure in playing them in their first game.

"Obviously there have been a few teams who have played their first games over the last 10 or 20 years who have done well [but] hopefully we can buck the trend and get a win."

The match will be the 200th of skipper Chris Judd's decorated career and while Carrazzo feels he definitely deserves a victory to celebrate his milestone, he said it had not been used as a motivating factor in the side's preparation.

The match is also significant for the club's most recent first round draft pick with Matthew Watson set to make his AFL debut.

With youngsters Zac Smith and Charlie Dixon manning the key forward posts for the Suns it's as good a time as any to blood the promising tall defender, but Carrazzo said he would still have his work cut out for him.

"He's still going to have Josh Fraser going down there so he's going to have no shortage of experienced players to play on," he said.

"It won't be any lighter an induction than any other game.

 "[But] he hasn't missed a beat. He's done a fantastic job in all the practice games he's played and he's shown that he's up to it straight away.

"Carlton fans should look forward to a good night from him and a long career."

Andrew Carrazzo is a $339,000 midfielder/defender in the Toyota AFL Dream Team competition.