Why Fantasy Betting Is So Popular in Ireland

With Dublin’s Croke Park hosting Wednesday night’s BOYLE Sports Cup friendly between Leeds United and Manchester United, it’s clear that Ireland’s interest in professional EPL football is growing every single year. Add gambling with bookies such as BOYLE Sports and Paddy Power into the mix, and you’ve all the makings of an extremely entertaining season of professional football to look forward to.

Irish football fans aren’t just showing more of an interest in EPL football, they’re also taking a page out of the books of their friends from across the Irish Sea, and are embracing football betting culture. Now, as you know, the Irish are no strangers to betting. And while EPL football isn’t on the same levels as, say, horseracing when it comes to betting, the interest is definitely growing.

As well as building weekly accumulators, Irish sports bettors with an interest in football are putting a great deal more time and energy into fantasy betting. Specifically, fantasy football according to betting experts Scs. But why the sudden interest?

Here’s a look at why fantasy betting is so popular in Ireland.

What is Fantasy Football?

Before we can explore why fantasy betting is now so popular across the Emerald Isle, we first need to ensure that everybody understands the basics behind what fantasy football is.

Basically, if you’re of a certain age and can remember when computer gaming wasn’t based around Fortnite, Rocket League, and Minecraft, you may remember the golden era of gaming. A time when you had computer games such as ‘Championship Manager’, along with ‘Premiership Manager’ and ‘Fifa Manager’.

For football fans, these games were amazing because they allowed you to step into the role of a pro football manager. Here, you could buy players, loan players out, hold training sessions, bid for players, rotate your squad, and so much more besides. These games were the ultimate because in theory, you could take a team like Mansfield Town from Division 3, all the way to the Champion’s League in a matter of seasons.

Why the gaming nostalgia trip? Because that’s essentially what fantasy football betting is. It’s an online game in which you can serve as manager of a football team, are given a virtual budget, and build an entire squad. Your team will then earn virtual points depending upon how well the players in your team have performed in the Premier League. If you’ve a prolific striker in your team, and he happens to bag a hat-trick over the weekend, his performance in the real world will then earn your fantasy football team online a significant number of points.

With fantasy football betting, you can either enter a season-long league with the aim of accumulating the most points at the end of the season, or enter daily/weekly fantasy sports where you can create a team for individual matches instead, or a shorter selection of matches.

Rather than betting on which team will win each match, you’re instead betting on how well the players in your virtual squad perform in the real world. The more points your players rack up for your team, the greater your chances are of making some money. Players are able to pick up points on all manner of different things. If you’ve drafted a keeper for example, he’ll rack up points for clean sheets and saving penalties. Players will pick up points for scoring goals, making tackles, creating chances, and making assists.

Why is Fantasy Betting So Popular in Ireland?

Okay, so now that we know more than the basics behind fantasy football, it’s time to look at why Ireland in particular, is now embracing fantasy betting with open arms. Currently, it is estimated that around 1 in 18 people in Ireland bet on fantasy football. That’s around 300,000, which isn’t too shabby.

Here are just a select few reasons why the Irish love their fantasy betting.

EPL Football is Popular in Ireland

To begin with, Ireland has very strong ties to the EPL, with a history that dates back centuries. Some of the biggest names in the world of football, both on the pitch and in the manager’s dugout, hail from Ireland. Names like Roy Keane, Robbie Keane, Martin O’Neill, Brendan Rogers, Shay Given, Dennis Irwin, and of course, George Best are prime examples of what we mean.

Through loyalty, family tradition, respect, and sheer appreciation of quality football, a large number of footy fans from Ireland follow EPL teams, particularly Liverpool and Man United. This is one of the main reasons why fantasy football in Ireland is so popular.

Fun and Testing

Building a fantasy football team is not just fun, there’s skill and football knowledge required. You need to calculate risks, work out a budget, take chances, and hope results go your way. This makes it a lot of fun.

Great Craic

Fantasy football isn’t just fun to play and bet upon, it’s also a great activity to discuss with your mates at the pub on a Friday night over a few of pints of the black stuff.

If your local watering hole is showing the big match, then even better. Imagine your star striker scoring a hat trick and your keeper keeping a clean sheet and saving a penalty? Bonus points if your mate has a number of players in the losing team.

Cautious Optimism

Finally, as the saying goes ‘it’s the hope that gets you’.

At the start of the season, as you’re making your picks and building your team, there’s a glimmer of hope. What if this is the year that you win big? All you need is for the players in your team to perform consistently well. You know it probably won’t happen, but there’s always a chance it will.