Three-time Geelong premiership player Steve Johnson took last season’s runner-up for a session on Saturday morning.

“I was just happy to get down and involved with the club to some small degree because over the last 16-17 years I haven’t had the chance to do much back here,” he said.

“I think there were 52 players there which was unheard of for this time of the year, so I was rapt to play a small role in the pre-season.”

The Pies have had a number of players at VFL-AFL level, but nobody can match Johnson’s 293 games, with 253 at the Cats and 40 at Greater Western Sydney.

The 2007 Norm Smith medallist in Geelong’s record 119-point drubbing of Port Adelaide, Johnson was also a three-time All-Australian.

After retiring at the end of 2017, Johnson spent last season on the Sydney Swans’ coaching staff.

A number of experts believe the perennial finalists are on the verge of falling out of contention.

“There’s never any certainties but I know the club’s got a great record of staying at the top because they have great people,” Johnson said.

“That’s probably my biggest thing from my time at Geelong, the great clubs stay up the top because they operate really well.

“It defies the evenness of the competition for those clubs that stay up there, eventually you’ve got to fall, but I still think we’ll be very hard to beat.”