Four days out from the AFL's inaugural game in China for competition points and there has been no stone left unturned in the way of publicly bashing anyone and everyone involved in playing this game in China.

Everyone knows the 'common sense' bits of staging this game makes no sense.

We all know Port Adelaide paid Gold Coast $500,000 to move this game from Metricon Stadium to China's most populated city this weekend.

We all know Port Adelaide, David Koch in particular, didn't want Gold Coast to wear their home guernsey because their colours are too similar to that of the Chinese flag, therefore presumably giving them more support, despite it being their 'home game'.

We also all know that only a handful of people, if at all, of those involved in the game are actually keen to play this game in China.

Just look at Aaron Hall's reaction.

So why is this game taking place?

Why now? Why ever?

Are the AFL looking at expansion into China? Of course not.

Is David Koch thinking of selling tarp sponsorship to a Chinese company? Well, that's more probable.

What's more bizarre is that the AFL are content with a crowd figure that Melbourne City FC would be proud of despite the city of Shanghai boasting a population of more than the whole of Australia.

Never mind the logistics from the AFL's point of view, a large percentage of rule changes in recent times in the AFL have been with player safety at the forefront of the rules committee.

Some people might sneer at the thought of the players having to fly economy class like the rest of us however Paul Roos put it quite simply.

"By the very nature of what it is called, we have players going to do their business in another country, so by the very nature of what it's called, it's called business class," he said.

Gold Coast coach Rodney Eade said his players would spend roughly 20-21 hours in transit en route to Shanghai, over four times more than their longest flight in Australia (to Perth).

This is the first competitive game outside of Australia - barring New Zealand which is closer to the east coast than Perth - and we've chosen to travel halfway across the world purely for a money-based exercise.

While I'm sure players will figure out ways to deal with the lengthy flying time in cattle class, one thing that is well out of their control is the catastrophic levels of air pollution in the Chinese city.

Gold Coast stated they will not be taking players with asthma or any other respiratory problems, and rightly so, with Shanghai's Air Quality Index (AQI) expected to hit 174 this week, almost seven times that of Melbourne's, which currently sits at 25.

Why not travel in July - still mid season and far enough from finals - when the air pollution is nearly half the unhealthy levels that it is today?

Not to mention hundreds of thousands of grains of sand skinning across Gary Ablett's perfectly-balded head in a potential sandstorm.

One can only hope that these real healthy factors were considered when the planning for this game - and subsequent others in the future - were taking place.

In February earlier this year, David Koch threatened the Suns by saying that if they wear their home jumpers, it'll be the last time they are invited to China.

I don't think they'll be complaining too much about that one.

Maybe it's best for 'Kochie' to stick to the purified air of his Channel 7 studio.