Geelong captain Tom Harley came through his return to action in the Cats’ VFL loss to Box Hill on Saturday.

In a pleasing return, the captain enhanced his immediate selection prospects with a solid performance down back, collecting 20 disposals and seven marks.

He played with confidence, including his trademark overhead marks dropping back into defence, and flung himself at the football to spoil Box Hill forward forays.

“The finger felt really good actually. I’d been handling the ball for only four or five days and I felt that side of my game was pretty good,” Harley said after the match.

“It got a little bit sore (at the start), but as the game got going and a bit more confidence it was fine.”

After watching the Cats surge up the AFL ladder on the back of three straight victories, Harley is as keen as ever to lead the side next week.

“I hope I can get back in the ones (next week), I’m dying to get out there and lead the side, the boys are playing really well,” he said.

“I wasn’t an emergency today, they just said go and have a run around and play the full game and it rounded out fine which is good. So I’ll be knocking on the door pretty hard.”

VFL coach Leigh Tudor was impressed with Harley’s return.

“Tom was excellent for us – I don’t think his opponent influenced the game at all,” he said.

“Tom did very well defensively and he also set us up with a lot of attacking plays as well, so he’d be very happy with his game.”

The Cats suffered an upset 15-point loss to cellar-dweller Box Hill.

After cruising to top spot on the VFL ladder last week with a fifth successive victory, the Cats were beaten in front of a home crowd.

In windy conditions that made attractive football impossible, the final score was 14-7 (91) to 9.22 (76).

Tim Callan and Sam Hunt were standouts across halfback for the Cats, while Brent Prismall continued his consistent VFL form with a resolute performance through the midfield.

Callan and Hunt complemented each other well in defence and weathered many Box Hill surges, while Prismall lead the way with 32 possessions and five marks.

The Cats were their own worst enemy and despite finding avenues into attack, squandered countless shots on goal.

Geelong never got into second gear apart from a belated third quarter resurgence that saw it wake from its lacklustre slumber and threaten to turn the complexity of the match on its head.

But every challenge was answered by the relentless Hawks, who seized the lead from the outset of the match and sustained its strangle hold on the contest throughout the game.

Tudor said he warned his side of the dangers of taking the bottom-of-the-ladder Hawks lightly.

“(Box Hill is) a very good side, they have a lot of early draft picks which we told the boys about before the game, but they just weren’t on today which was disappointing,” he said.

The loss will most likely amount to nothing more than an aberration considering the Cats have in recent weeks had a propensity of belting teams into submission.

And it is with that optimism that Tudor believes the Cats can bounce back against the Northern Bullants in a fortnight’s time.

“We can most definitely (bounce back),” Tudor said.

“I don’t think we used the ball at all well today, they were a bit harder around the ground at the stoppages, they played very well and our boys when we did win the contested ball just didn’t use it well – we went too wide.

“When we did have our chances, we missed too many goals. We had opportunities to kick goals and we just missed too many goals, which hurt us in the end.”