Australia’s Rugby Sevens coach Geraint John won’t consider luring the nation’s top players to his team until after next year’s Rugby World Cup.

Australia begins its quest to qualify for the inaugural Rugby Sevens tournament at the 2016 Olympics at this weekend’s Gold Coast Sevens.

The Gold Coast event is the first of nine in this year’s IRB World Sevens series, which also doubles as an Olympic qualifier.

The top-four ranked nations at the end of the series will earn automatic berths to Rio.

Despite the obvious lure of chasing Olympic glory, John says potentially devastating Sevens players such as Israel Folau, Kurtley Beale and James O’Connor are not yet on his radar.

“At the moment the 15s and Wallabies are preparing for the World Cup. Let’s remember that,” he told AAP.

“They’re not available so I’m not even looking at them. That’s quite right as well. The Wallabies have the priority.”

John, who led Australia to bronze at this year’s Commonwealth Games, said while some players have shown an interest in going to the Olympics, his immediate priority is qualifying.

Australia have only finished in the top four at the end of an IRB World Sevens series three times, the last of which was in the 2009-10 campaign.

“We’ve got a plan … 15s players are very good players. You can’t hide the fact that they’re good distributors of the ball, they’re good decision makers but we have to qualify first,” he told AAP.

“I know some players have said they want to go to the Olympics but there’s no guarantee we’re there. We’ve got to qualify.”

While established rugby union stars are off the table at the moment, John says if athletes from another code are keen to test themselves at Sevens, he’s willing to listen.

Former NRL player Shannon Walker, who will miss this weekend’s tournament with injury, is an established member of the Sevens setup and John says he’d be foolish not to look at others who want in.

“I’m not going to say no to athletes if they have a certain pedigree, not just in union, but in league or AFL or other sports,” he said.

“If they’ve got a desire to come in and try it out then I’m willing to open to door to help them.”