GEELONG coach Chris Scott admits his players will spend much of this week recovering from Monday's punishing clash against Hawthorn.

The Cats face an in-form North Melbourne side at Etihad Stadium on Sunday evening, with a six-day break making it even tougher for the reigning premiers.

"Are we going to be affected because it was a hard game? Probably," Scott said at Simonds Stadium on Wednesday morning.

"But we've got to be able to rise above that.

"We've got a pretty resilient group, and they've been through that before, so we'll back our people in to make sure we're as well prepared as possible."

Star forward Steve Johnson is among the players who are being treated for knocks they received in the two-point victory over the Hawks.

Johnson suffered a corked thigh early in the second half, although he was able to run out the game.

"We've got a few corkies; we do every week," Scott explained.

"Steve's was significant, and it did affect him a bit towards the end of the third quarter.

"He seemed to be able to get through it well in the last quarter, so we'd expect him to be OK.

"But it's pretty early days."

After the Cats lost their cool at times during their loss to Fremantle in round one, Scott was much happier with the discipline shown by his men in the win over Hawthorn.

"It was definitely an improvement, and we know that we needed to improve to compete against the best sides," he said.

"We still gave away a few 50s, but I think all bar one were technical-type 50s.

"But that's discipline as well … making sure you know the rules and adhere to them to the letter."

Big man Orren Stephenson, who was a late withdrawal from the team that beat the Hawks with a virus, is expected to return this weekend.

Stephenson will partner first-choice ruckman Trent West against North Melbourne duo Todd Goldstein and Hamish McIntosh.

"Our preferred structure … is two strong key forwards and two ruckman," Scott said.

In preparing for this week, Scott and his coaching staff have scrutinised the Kangaroos' narrow loss to Essendon in round one far more heavily than their 129-point thumping of Greater Western Sydney last weekend.

"It's not [the Giants'] fault," Scott said. "I hope everyone understands what GWS are trying to do, and the difficulties they face.

"Essendon put up a pretty strong contest on round one, and if we're going to learn anything about North that's probably the best indication we're going to get so far this year."

Nevertheless, Scott was impressed by the Roos' performance against the Giants.

"They were certainly able to use the ball quite well," he said. "It was windy conditions down there as well, so they were quite impressive.

"Hopefully we can defend a little bit more than GWS did."