Daily fantasy sports platform developer Mondogoal has finally made its debut in the Italian market.
The Boston-based daily fantasy sports company teamed up with Italian online sports betting platform Intralot to introduce their football games in the European country.
In a statement, Mondogoal founder and CEO Shergul Arshad said the company’s entry into Italy will ensure that “Italian users will now have an enhanced gaming experience similar to our users in the UK and the United States.”
“Intralot is the first of our deals with online sports betting sites overseas. Unlike other who talk about integration, we have been heads down executing on this integration. As a Serie A fan and fan of Fantasy Soccer for 25 years, I hope many legions of fantasy soccer fans in Italy can now share in the vision and play [for] fun and for cash,” Arshad said.
Mondogoal, which already holds a UK gaming license, has already forged partnerships with Chelsea, West Ham and Spurs in the English Premier League. It also works with Barcelona and Valencia in Spain’s La Liga, and Roma in Italy’s Serie A.
The company currently offers daily and match-day fantasy football games, covering not only the Serie A, Premier League and La Liga, but also Ligue 1, Champions League, Europa League and the Brasileirao, among others.
Now, Mondogoal will also start offering cash-prize DFS extension to the games.
In this new feature, players will have to pick a starting 11 and compete in either a head-to-head battle with other users or engage in multi-user tournaments. Points are then awarded for various “measurable actions,” such as goals, assists, tackles won or lost, shots on goal, passes completed, and clean sheets, according to the company.
Daily fantasy sports websites experienced a sudden boost in popularity across the United States, thanks to the increased promotion of its products on national TV broadcast networks. But unlike DraftKings and FanDuel, many sports fans probably haven’t heard of Mondogoal, which offers only soccer contests.
On the other hand, Mondogoal has also been largely insulated from the industry’s issues in the U.S.—unlike DraftKings and FanDuel—mainly because U.S. isn’t its focus. In an interview with Boston.com, Arshad said his company “derives 90 percent of its revenue from across the pond, where it has partnered with major soccer clubs—and where it operates as a licensed gambling company.”
