Australian Football League side Port Adelaide plans to stage an AFL premiership match in China next year in a bid to "better promote the sport in the Asian nation," according to the AFP. Port Adelaide, the AFL and the club's new sponsor Shanghai Cred Real Estate "signed a memorandum of understanding for the game in China" in '17. Under the agreement, the parties will "also work with China Central Television to broadcast AFL coverage in China and build up social media accounts on WeChat and Weibo." The agreement follows a multi-million dollar partnership signed this week between Port Adelaide and Shanghai Cred, "which will use Port Adelaide to promote the Australian national game in the world’s most populous nation" (AFP, 4/14). In London, Smyth & Hornby reported as Chinese President Xi Jinping "tries to shoot China into the ranks of world football superpowers," Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull on Thursday began his first visit to the country with a spot of "footy diplomacy" of a different variety. Turnbull said that AFL "is the most exciting football code." He said, "An enormous field, extraordinary athleticism -- it is the leaping, jumping flying game, where the big men fly." AFL, or "footy," is a fast and at times "brutal sport, which Canberra is keen to export to China as part of a push to build cultural links with its biggest trading partner." Analysts said that Turnbull will "need the agility of a footy player on his trip to China," where he must balance economic objectives with calls from the U.S. for Canberra to take a "tougher stance on Beijing’s activities in the South China Sea." Australian National University professor Hugh White said, "There is a distinct sense that things are coming to a head in the South China Sea. Turnbull's well rehearsed line that Beijing must adhere to a rules-based order is starting to look like a feeble line as China steps up its efforts" (FINANCIAL TIMES, 4/14).
