Former amateur boxer Barry Hall is caught in the biggest scrap of his career, but his fight with the AFL Tribunal is out of his hands.

The Swans skipper is in serious danger of missing the premiership decider against West Coast, after being charged with a level two striking offence.

Interestingly, the chairman of the match review panel which laid the charge, Peter Schwab, would have a fair idea of the torment Hall is experiencing, after missing Hawthorn's 1989 premiership through suspension.

An early guilty plea without a trip to the tribunal, for Hall's jab to the stomach of St Kilda's Matt Maguire, would rub him out of Sydney's first grand final in nine years.

Hall has been Sydney's best player this season, playing in all 25 matches and his teammates admitted he was a crucial part of the team's bid to snap a 72-year premiership drought.

The Swans brainstrust was bunkered down on Monday, formulating a plan to get their brilliant centre-half forward off the hook for the biggest day on the football calendar.

The incident, which was assessed by the panel as reckless, of low impact, behind the play and body contact, would normally carry a two-week suspension but would be reduced to one match with an early guilty plea.

Hall has two options - take an early guilty plea and then attempt to convince a tribunal jury of three former players that his strike on Maguire was negligent rather than reckless and/or in play rather than behind play.

If he is successful on either count, the striking offence would be downgraded to level one and a discount for an early guilty plea would allow Hall to play in the grand final.

The other, less likely, option, is he will plead not guilty and Sydney's legal team will then need to convince the tribunal he did not strike Maguire.

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