The first ever AFL game to play for premiership points outside of Australia and New Zealand, was held in Shanghai on Sunday afternoon.
Port Adelaide put in several months of effort in order to stage a game in China to play for four points, and their hard work paid off when they won against the Suns by 72 points. There was much speculation about finances, travel time and air quality leading up to the game, but on the day there was nothing really to complain about. The only thing that seemed to go wrong was when Port Adelaide's team song began blaring out of the stadium's speakers instead of the Australian national anthem. The game was a success, with a sold out crowd of 10,118, made up of fans who traveled from Australia, and Chinese locals. Port Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley said that he was looking forward to returning to Jiangwan Sports Stadium in the future after handing the Suns a thumping to jump back into the top eight. "We can't wait to defend the title. We're undefeated here in Shanghai, why wouldn't we want to play here?" Hinkley said. "It's great for the club, and I think the club wants to do this again. "It is not just taking it as a 'Mickey Mouse' game once-off, this is what we want to do as a football club." Brad Ebert received the best-on-ground medal after racking up 31 disposals, where 19 of them were claimed in the first half. Ebert stated that playing on the ground in Shanghai was very similar to playing at Adelaide Oval, the only major difference being the weather. "[The ground] was in fantastic shape. I don't know if they did it deliberately, but it felt very much Adelaide Oval-like," Ebert said. "The heat was probably something. In Adelaide it's starting to cool down a little bit as you can probably tell, so that side of it was a little bit different, but it was nothing that we felt 'oh, we can't handle this, it's too hot,' it was fine out there." After an average performance last week, Robbie Gray showed improvement when he booted two goals and had 13 touches. The star forward didn't appear to be at his best, after a few niggling injuries almost sidelined him before the start of the game. Gray will get the opportunity to rest, as Port Adelaide have a bye this week. Justin Westhoff scored what looked like to be an impossible goal from the right forward pocket. As the ball bounced towards the boundary line, Westhoff kicked the ball soccer-style towards the goal square in an attempt to keep the ball in play. The ball bounced through the posts, giving Westhoff his first goal of the game late in the second quarter. It is surely expected to be a contender for goal of the year. Suns coach Rodney Eade was disappointed in his side's performance, agreeing with a statement that it was one of their worst performance's under his coaching tenure. "That's as disappointed as I've been," Eade said. "I didn't see that coming. The preparation was good, the attitude seemed good. We were just smashed in tight, [in] contested ball. "It was extremely disappointing." Port Adelaide will be in talks with the AFL to play more games in China, in the future.
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