Australian swimmer Nick D'Arcy has escaped a prison term after receiving a suspended sentence for assaulting former Commonwealth Games champion Simon Cowley.

D'Arcy, 21, had pleaded guilty to a charge of inflicting grievous bodily harm on Cowley in a nightclub brawl last year and was sentenced in a Sydney court yesterday.

Prosecutors had asked the court to jail D'Arcy but his lawyers pleaded for a non-custodial sentence, arguing that D'Arcy had already suffered enough by being excluded from the Beijing Olympics.

The judge in charge of the case agreed and handed D'Arcy a suspended sentence of 14 months, telling the court he had "very good prospects of rehabilitation."

In handing down his judgment, Magistrate John Favretto accepted that D'Arcy had been provoked by Cowley but said his response was excessive.

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