Serious knee injury victims Max Bailey and Nick Malceski have the chance to re-establish themselves as senior players on Sunday when Hawthorn and Sydney collide in a significant AFL fixture at the SCG.

Hawks' 206cm ruckman Bailey has played just six senior games in five and a half seasons and Sunday's game will be his first since 2009 following a third knee reconstruction.

Swans' half back Malceski is making a comeback from a second LARS operation after injuring his knee in the pre-season.

Bailey effectively replaces David Hale who hurt his knee against St Kilda last week, as did defender Stephen Gilham.

Hale, Gilham and Isaac Smith (soreness) have been replaced in the Hawks line-up by Bailey, Ryan Schoenmakers and dangerous forward Cyril Rioli who has recovered from a hamstring problem.

Forward Jarryd Roughead has been named as the Hawks' starting ruckman, though Bailey is bound to share the load.

The Swans decided against recalling Mark Seaby and again opted for Lewis Roberts-Thomson as Shane Mumford's back-up.

Malceski's inclusion for youngster Nathan Gordon was the only change to the Swans' side which thrashed Port Adelaide.

A couple of newspaper headlines on Friday referred to him as a miracle man, but Malceski was having none of that.

"No, not at all mate. I've just been doing what I needed to do. I've been fortunate enough to get back a little bit sooner," Malceski told reporters at the SCG on Friday before training.

"I was positive throughout the rehab and did really well and I got back a bit sooner rather than later."

Malceski said he was as confident as ever and had no trepidation about returning to the seniors with relatively little football under his belt.

The experienced half back rejected any suggestions he might be mentally scarred, having endured multiple knee injuries and operations.

"I haven't really even thought about it to be honest. I brushed it to the back of my mind and just got on with the job I needed to get on with," Malceski said.

He certainly wasted no time in updating Swans coach John Longmire on his progress and badgering him for a game.

"I thought he was setting up a bed in my office and I had to evict him out of my office a couple of times during last week, let alone this week," Longmire joked on Friday.

Roughead is likely to spend time in his more customary role up forward where Rioli and Lance Franklin will also provide problems for the Sydney defence.

"What we do with Buddy (Franklin) is hopefully stop the ball getting anywhere near him. That's number one plan," Longmire said.

"Number two plan is hope his defender stops him and then number three plan will be hopefully get about four or five blokes to try and stop him."

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