Coach Alastair Clarkson said there was every chance the former North Melbourne defender could come up against Hall, who will be playing his first game in Bulldogs colours.
“I’m certain if Barry’s playing his first game for the Dogs it will be a good test for both of them," Clarkson said. "The most important thing for Josh is to get among the structures for our back six and the rest of the players.
“I’m sure it’s going to be the same for Hally and the Western Bulldogs.
"It’s really just to get them running around and used to new teammates and the system of players at new clubs.”
Gibson is the only major inclusion for Hawthorn this week, with teammates Shaun Burgoyne, Chance Bateman, Michael Osborne and Cyril Rioli to stay on the sidelines as they come back from injury.
Bateman in particular cut a lone figure, jogging slow laps by himself and leaving the track before the main training session on Thursday.
“They’ll probably come into contention over NAB three and NAB four," Clarkson said. "Cyril Rioli is exactly the same, we’ll start to wind him up over the next week or so.
“He’s had a fair amount of rest now and he’s responded really well to that rest.
"We’ll only know the full extent of his injury once we do try to wind him up to full pace again.”
Former NBL player Matt Shanahan ran the Hawks through some basketball-style defensive moves earlier in the week but Clarkson says his involvement was not simply an attempt to finetune the team’s rolling zone.
“We had some things to do with footwork and our tackling," Clarkson said. "We thought we could get some assistance from basketball and Matt was good enough to come down and give us some advice."
Clarkson stopped short of echoing comments made by Hawks president Jeff Kennett about the introduction of free agency.
Kennett was critical of its introduction but Clarkson said he was not concerned about Kennett going public with his opinions.
“I admire our president for at least having the courage to speak his mind and put it out there when there’s a wave of emotion that suggests we should go to free agency,” he said.
“He makes some good solid points but we just need to study those over the next two years to see where the game goes and whether or not free agency is a good thing for our game.”
