FanDuel is one of the biggest Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) operators in the United States. The company recently announced that it will now allow bettors to place their wagers on live sports streams that will be available via their website and app. FanDuel now becomes the first company in the US to offer such a service.
This service will be now available after FanDuel further strengthened its partnership with the Swiss firm, Sportradar AG.
Initially, wagering will be limited to German Bundesliga football games and midlevel tennis games but FanDuel is happy to make this happen for its US bettors.
The company is confident that its players will find it very convenient to watch these games and bet on them via the same platform. This is bound to generate more interest in these games which are not as popular as some of the other mainstream games like the NFL and NBA.
FanDuel Sportsbook GM Niall Connell expects betting interest for these sports will increase significantly and result in double and even triple the usual number of bets, once the odds are flashed with the game. He added that people like to see the game’s outcome when they have a wager at stake. The fact that these tennis and Bundesliga games will be streamed is special as they are not usually seen on TV.
Live Stream Betting Common In EU
Live stream betting on sports is not common in the United States but it is very popular in European countries. Major sports leagues like the Premier League and the National Basketball League (NBA) allow people to bet on its games while streaming in Europe. There is a limitation on the size and resolution of the video feeds to protect the media rights of companies who have paid for them.
This matter is the limiting factor in the US since all the major sports leagues have ironclad agreements with media companies for their premium content that have been finalized before sports betting was legalized by US states. Market analysts believe that once these deals become up for renewal, the NBA and Major League Baseball (MLB) will come out with separate media deals and address these clauses so that they can open up live streaming to betting operators and bring in additional revenues to their respective leagues.
While this new setup is a positive for FanDuel, the company is not getting exclusive rights for access to these live streaming sports. Sportradar AG, who will sell the data and live rights to these games to FanDuel, can technically also have the same agreement with FanDuel’s competitors like DraftKings and William Hill.
