iGaming Business magazine iGB 112 Sept/Oct 2018 | Page 46

Sports Betting
SCOUT GAMING INTRODUCES
EXPECTED FANTASY POINTS
Andreas Sundal describes how Scout’s expected fantasy points could be the latest turn of
the wheel in DFS
Andreas Sundal is chief product officer
at Scout Gaming Group, the leading global
B2B Fantasy Sports and pool betting provider.
In recent years we’ve been exposed to an increasing number
of statistics in football broadcasts. Every pre- or post-match
and respectable live broadcast now includes considerable
amounts of statistics.
The term ‘expected goals’ (xG) was introduced in an article
by Sam Green at Opta Sports in 2012, in which he discussed the
actual performance of Premier League players and goalkeepers in
comparison to how many goals they should have scored or saved.
Since then, the term and calculation of expected goals is
frequently used by media, punters, statisticians and bookmakers
as an important benchmark.
At Scout Gaming Group we have introduced the term
‘expected fantasy points’ (xFP), opening up a whole new market
for the betting industry.
Through our innovative and ground-breaking xFP scoring
system - developed to be entertaining and easily calculated by
viewers - we have effectively created an objective scale to settle
much more than Daily Fantasy tournaments.
Imagine a big game coming up, such as Liverpool vs
Manchester City. The pre-match discussions and build-up is
present everywhere: at work, in school, by pundits on TV, social
media and newspapers.
Often, you’ll find yourself discussing which players will
perfor m the best in the upcoming game. Will it be Salah,
Agüero, Mané or maybe Sterling who will win it for their club?
Who will be best out of Salah and Sterling? Even after the match
is over, discussions are ongoing. How to decide who was better?
Was it the player scoring most goals? Was it the player that had
most assists? Fantasy points hold the key to these questions.
By introducing a universal fantasy scoring system which enables
rewarding players with points based on important events in the
match, discussions relating to fantasy points are eliminated.
For every sport, league and game that we support, we calculate
xFP for the players in the upcoming event(s). This is used to calculate
e.g. the purchase price in a DFS tournament and makes DFS more
enticing and fun.
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iGamingBusiness | Issue 112 | September/October 2018
Mohamed Salah (home vs Manchester City) xFP: 7.54
Raheem Sterling (away vs Liverpool) xFP: 5.45
Probability for Salah to get more fantasy points than Sterling is 58%,
while Sterling holds the other 42% (disregarding draw as an option).
Creating a head-to-head bet between these players, the odds are 1.72
on Salah getting more fantasy points than Sterling, while the odds are
2.38 on Sterling.
Offering same position head-to-head duels in a single game is great.
But by mixing completely different positions, for completely different
matches, or even different leagues greatly increases the potential of
this market.
Three-way fantasy points duel before bookies margin
Lionel Messi (home vs Valencia) xFP: 9.68 = 42.1% probability to
win the duel = 2.37 odds
Christian Eriksen (home vs West Ham) xFP: 8.65 = 37.6% probability
= 2.65 odds
David de Gea (away vs Fulham) xFP: 4.67 = 20.3% probability
= 4.90 odds
Having xFP available for all players, users can request fantasy duels,
build their own bets, or bet on well-known bet types such as over/
under fantasy points on each player.
It also allows betting on your own fantasy team, by calculating total
xFP for your entire team and giving odds based on how many points
the team achieves compared to what was expected. Setting up two or
more fantasy teams against each other and allowing users to bet on
which of the teams to generate most points is also an easy operation.
Scout Gaming is the only global provider of xFP, and the betting
industry is not the only one where xFP are applied. Pre/post-match
analysis and media content are also valuable areas of use. We are
making xFP a standardised part of the sport industry.
The key to making xFP successful is to have an interesting, easily
understandable and fair scoring system. Once achieved, the gains
are huge. Matches certainly become more interesting due to the
different ways your bets can be won.
No longer are bets just decided on who won the match or how
many corners a match contained, but a combination of all the key
events in the match. Bets are often live until the very end of a match,
keeping users entertained longer. Watching uninteresting matches
suddenly becomes a hell of a lot more interesting when one of your
players is on the pitch.