FanDuel hasn’t added a new sport to its lineup of daily fantasy sports in quite some time.
Soccer, now at FanDuel
That changed on Wednesday, when the DFS operator announced it was launching contests based on soccer’s English Premier League. Contests are planned to roll out next week.
“Our ultimate goal is for fans of all sports to experience what FanDuel has to offer,” Nigel Eccles, CEO of FanDuel, said in a press release. “As we continue to enhance our core product, we look forward to giving the millions of US soccer fans access to the same game day excitement that bring other sports fans to our platform.”
Inside the FanDuel soccer product
To date, the only sports FanDuel had offered were the major North American pro sports: NFL, NBA, NHL and Major League Baseball.
Now, its users can play contests based on the EPL schedule; the season is going on already, for those that are not big soccer (or football) aficianados.
FanDuel’s DFS contests will feature eight-man rosters (goalkeeper, two defensemen, three midfielders and two forwards) and a $60,000 salary cap. Here are the scoring categories:
The product is just for EPL matches for now; Major League Soccer, the major North American soccer league, is not covered. FanDuel also said its “Friends Mode” will be available for EPL at a later date.
Why now for FanDuel and a new sport?
FanDuel went live in the UK earlier this year with a soccer product; launching a US-facing soccer product piggybacks off of that effort, to some extent, although the products are slightly different.
FanDuel has let competitor DraftKings take the ball and run with it, so to speak, on other fantasy sports. such as NASCAR, golf and mixed martial arts. Some of that reasoning likely has to do with the limitations of the fantasy sports carveout in the UIGEA. But soccer, a team sport much like FanDuel’s other offerings, brings up no such concerns.
The EPL has gained a greater following in the US in recent years, as NBC broadcasts some of the league’s games.
