Presumably because it’s Christmas Eve, there is no NFL game on Thursday this week … or the rest of the season. However, there is a game on Christmas on Friday, meaning the unique 2020 season will be even more unique in one regard. It’s the first season at least one NFL game has been played every single day of the week. A few games earlier in the year were moved to Tuesday and Wednesday due to COVID-19 postponements.
The Christmas game, which goes up against the NBA’s loaded five-game slate in that league’s marquee regular-season day, features the Minnesota Vikings at the New Orleans Saints. It has potential playoff ramifications for both – the Vikings are barely alive, while the Saints could clinch the NFC South with a victory. The teams met in the Wild-Card round in January in the Big Easy and the Vikings pulled off a 26-20 overtime walk-off stunner on a controversial TD pass. New Orleans is -7 this time, and the favorite has won seven of the past eight in the regular-season series.
There are three Saturday games in Week 16, and the marquee matchup is the primetime affair between the Miami Dolphins and Las Vegas Raiders from Sin City. That has potential playoff ramifications for both and is Miami’s first-ever trip to Las Vegas. It could be an all-Hawaiian QB matchup between Dolphins rookie Tua Tagovailoa (who will start) and the Raiders’ Marcus Mariota (who probably starts with Derek Carr injured). Miami is -3 and 9-1 ATS in its past 10 games.
Last week, we spoke to The Secret Coach about the bottom half of the Premier League and how each of the 10 teams that occupy the lower half positions are struggling.
This week, it’s the turn of those lucky ten teams who sit in the upper echelons of the English Premier League.
The Secret Coach is a professional football coach in English football… who will remain anonymous. The Secret Coach has worked with some of the biggest names in the game, been through the coaching badges and is currently part of the coaching team at an English league side… and that’s all we’re telling you. As ever, this week, The Secret Coach pulls no punches!
Who is doing well and why? Let’s delve into The Secret Coach’s half-term report, with some A-grade action along the way.
The quarter-finals of the Carabao Cup take place over the next couple of days and with a couple of Championship sides aiming to shock the established Premier League forces, we’ll know who make the semi-finals by the end of Wednesday evening in the United Kingdom.
Where is the sportsbetting value in the games ahead, however? Let’s take a look at each side’s chances and find some decent value bets to go for.
Brentford vs. Newcastle United (5.30 GMT kick-off)
The first game to take place will light up the Brentford Community Stadium as twilight descends in West London. Brentford host Newcastle United and far from it being a shock prediction that The Bees will win, bookies are buzzing about their chances, to the extent that the Championship side are favourites.
The National Basketball Retired Players Association (NBRPA) announced today that veteran NBA columnist and renowned basketball insider Peter Vecsey ([email protected]) has joined its content team, sharing his thoughts via his popular Hoop du Jour platform each week. Hoop du Jour will be featured content for Legends Media & Entertainment (LME), the multifaceted story-telling platform producing, distributing and quantifying the wide-reaching stories of many of the NBA and WNBA’s biggest stars that was launched in September and has seen record growth since launch. Athletes First Partners represents the NBRPA in its marketing endeavors and is working on engaging with brands on the platform as well.
Vecsey, the long-time columnist for the New York Post and analyst for TNT/TBS, NBC and NBATV, is one of the most connected and engaged media members in the sport. His opinions, insights and quips about the game–both past and present–have long been required reading for anyone involved or interested in basketball.
The native New Yorker has been enshrined in four Halls of Fame, including Naismith Basketball (Class of 2009), NYC Basketball, Rucker League and Archbishop Molloy.
“If there is any media member who knows our players and our audience, it is Peter Vecsey,” NBRPA President and CEO Scott Rochelle said. “Hoop du Jour was a business and lockerroom must read for decades. Peter’s ability to tell stories in his own style will certainly resonate not just with our current audience, but with a growing number of new fans who love basketball and its personalities. We are confident it’s going to be a must-read and must-follow as our other content has become this fall.”
“The men and women who make up the NBRPA were, and are, the most engaging and interesting athletes anywhere,” Vecsey said. “I’m looking forward to having some fun with them, telling and retelling their stories, and showing a new (and not-so-new) audience just how much noise we can make in this space.”
The NBRPA represents over 1,000 former NBA and WNBA players, making it the largest agency of its kind in basketball. In three months LME in both audio and video has drawn almost 600,000 views and listens, more than three times the combined numbers of audio and video around the players in the previous nine months. Viewers and listeners have come from over 20 countries, and have enjoyed content from some of the most unique storytellers in the history of professional basketball. The key unified elements of LME include: Legends Magazine, Legends Studios, the All-Access Legends Podcastand the NBRPA’s social media strategy and content.
As the NFL regular season starts to wind down, the NBA is beginning to get its regular season wound up. The official start of the season is today, after only about two months since the LA Lakers were crowned champions in the previous season, and basketball players are already out on the courts participating in preseason matches. The Bodog sportsbook is still seeing most of its action on football games, but the NBA is going to give the NFL and college football some competition.
This past weekend, the NFL and the NCAA Football (NCAAF) program accounted for just over 70% of the wagers on Bodog – 48.54% and 21.54%, respectively. NCAA Men’s Basketball (NCAAB) came in next, grabbing 18.08% of the action. Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) took fourth with 3.08% and the NBA’s preseason weekend action pulled down 2.01% of all the wagers placed on the sportsbook. Soccer games continue to find a lot of interest, with the Bundesliga, the Premier League, Spain’s La Liga and E-Soccer combining for 5.4% of the bets. Sandwiched between the Premier League and La Liga, the Chinese Basketball Association picked up 1.36%.
As far as which games saw the most action, the NFL and the NCAAF controlled the board. The postseason for both starts in a few weeks and there will still be a lot of wagers going their way, but gamblers will undoubtedly be looking more and more at the NBA and NCAAB as these seasons get cranking. As far as which football games were the most attractive this weekend, the winner of the top spot might be a surprise.
The Cleveland Browns and the New York Giants faced off this weekend, and the Browns walked away with a 20-6 victory. Gamblers who backed them also enjoyed the win, as long as they didn’t take the Over of 44.5. This game saw 20.2% of the wagers on Bodog, making it the weekend leader on the sportsbook.
The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Miami Heat in the NBA Finals barely more than two months ago in the Orlando bubble, and the shortest offseason in league history ends already Tuesday night as the 2020-21 season tips off with two games: Golden State Warriors at Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Clippers at Los Angeles Lakers. Both will be shown on TNT.
There are sky-high expectations for the Nets with all-world player and future Hall of Famer Kevin Durant joining Kyrie Irving to form one of the best 1-2 punches in the NBA. However, Durant is coming off one of the most serious injuries an athlete can suffer, a torn Achilles’ tendon in Game 5 of 2019 NBA Finals against Toronto when Durant was a member of … the Warriors.
Brooklyn signed Durant to a huge free-agent deal ahead of last season even though it knew KD wouldn’t play at all in 2019-20. Irving, meanwhile, was limited to just 20 games last season due to his own injury problems. Tuesday will also be the NBA head coaching debut of one of the league’s best-ever point guards, two-time MVP Steve Nash.
OwnersBox, an innovative sport-tech company behind the new Weekly Fantasy Sports (WFS) platform is ecstatic to announce that they have partnered with top NHL fantasy sports content site DailyFaceoff.
As OwnersBox gears up for their inaugural fantasy hockey season, the team wanted to expand their reach and make a big splash. Daily Faceoff has been a leader in the hockey space for over a decade and prides themselves on being the fastest and most accurate site for projected and confirmed starting goalies as well as line combinations. They provide daily news, projections, and tools for fantasy hockey players across North America.
When asked for comment, President & CEO Brian Kipp stated: “As we actively prepare for the upcoming NBA & NHL seasons, we wanted to target a well-known trusted platform such as DailyFaceoff to leverage their network and help grow the Weekly Fantasy Sports movement. I’ve been an active Daily Faceoff user for years and am excited to work with the DFO team this year.”
OwnersBox and the Daily Faceoff will begin their relationship at the start of the 2021 season and will be collaborating through content, social media & weekly fantasy sports strategy articles. This partnership will allow OwnersBox to keep their momentum going from the NFL season into the new year with the NBA and NHL on the horizon.
The NFL will offer plenty of offense this Christmas, with two of the top offenses in the league set to square off and four games with an over/under set at 51.5 points or more in Week 16. So many high point totals shouldn’t be a surprise, according to analysts from TheLines, which tracks odds in U.S. regulated sports betting markets. In fact, the NFL is on a historic scoring pace.
Sunday night’s game between the Tennessee Titans, which leads the NFL with 31.1 points per game, and Green Bay Packers, which is third at 31 points per game, promises two of the most prolific scoring teams in the NFL. Total points for the game as of Monday morning is 56, according to a consensus of the nation’s largest legal online sportsbooks — including DraftKings, FanDuel, PointsBet, PlaySugarHouse, BetMGM, Unibet, and William Hill. No game has offered more points this season.
But games offered at 50 total points or more have not been uncommon this year. In fact, there were five such games in Week 15 alone. Points have been up significantly all year. Through the first 15 weeks, NFL teams are averaging 24.8 points per game, up dramatically from 22.8 points per game in 2019. Barring a points outage over the season’s final games, it should break the scoring average record of 23.6 points per team per game, set in 1948.
“In a season of anomalies, we may never see so many high point totals again,” said Brett Collson, lead analyst for TheLines.com. “There are so many reasons why scoring is up, and many of them are related to the pandemic, from fewer distractions with teams being in relative isolation to quiet stadiums helping road teams stay in sync. Regardless, oddsmakers continue to do well in making adjustments.”
The consensus point spreads for Week 16 and remaining Week 15 games, as of Monday, Dec. 21:
Pittsburgh Steelers (-14.5) at Cincinnati Bengals; over/under 40.5
Minnesota Vikings at New Orleans Saints (-7); over/under 51.5
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (-9) at Detroit Lions; over/under 53.5
San Francisco 49ers at Arizona Cardinals (-3.5); over/under 49.5
Miami Dolphins (-2.5) at Las Vegas Raiders; over/under 47.5
Carolina Panthers at Washington Football Team (-1.5); over/under 44.5
Chicago Bears (-7) at Jacksonville Jaguars; over/under 47
Cincinnati Bengals at Houston Texans (-8.5); over/under 45
Cleveland Browns (-10) at New York Jets; over/under 44.5
Indianapolis Colts at Pittsburgh Steelers (-3); over/under N/A
New York Giants at Baltimore Ravens (-10); over/under N/A
Denver Broncos at Los Angeles Chargers (-3); over/under 48.5
Atlanta Falcons at Kansas City Chiefs (-10.5); over/under 53
Los Angeles Rams at Seattle Seahawks (-1.5); over/under 46.5
Philadelphia Eagles (-1.5) at Dallas Cowboys; over/under 49.5
Tennessee Titans at Green Bay Packers (-4); over/under 56
Buffalo Bills (-6.5) at New England Patriots; over/under 45
To access the updated futures lines for every NFL team, and for more analysis, visit TheLines.com/odds/super-bowl. To access Week 16 odds, visit www.thelines.com/nfl-week-16-lines-2020.
For Soccer Ventures (FSV), an organization focused on the growth and long-term development of American soccer, today announced it has completed the acquisition of Alianza de Futbol and JUGOtv, groundbreaking Hispanic soccer companies engaging with and offering opportunities for the underserved Hispanic soccer community in the U.S.
For nearly two decades, Alianza de Futbol implements identification programs, coaching clinics, and tournaments in Hispanic communities throughout the U.S. that have historically existed outside of the traditional structure of American soccer. These programs have offered the opportunity for participation to male and female players, and led to the identification of dozens of future professional players such as Mexico’s National Team player Jonathan González. JUGOtv has operated as the content studio and social media arm of Alianza de Futbol, featuring one of the premier American Hispanic social channels.
“As we set about our mission to transform soccer in America, we began identifying the entities and the stakeholders who’d been doing it successfully for years. Alianza de Futbol and JUGOtv are the benchmarks for creating a more inclusive American soccer community,” FSV founder and Philadelphia Union investor Richie Graham said. “As part of FSV, we hope to bring these organizations closer to the fold with our partners, offering even greater opportunities for Hispanic soccer players in the U.S. and establishing a richer and more robust soccer community for everyone.”
Founded in 2004 by Richard Copeland and Brad Rothenberg, the son of former US Soccer Federation President and 1994 FIFA World Cup organizer Alan Rothenberg, Alianza de Futbol has been a one-of-a-kind opportunity for male and female soccer players outside of the traditional club system in the U.S. Since the program’s launch, players have come from 46 states and more than one thousand U.S. cities, connecting over 3.2 million hispanic families to the Alianza de Futbol community. Additionally, over seventy seven alumni have gone on to play professionally and twenty three have received youth national team invitations.
Working with commercial partners, Alianza de Futbol hosts weekend long activations in Hispanic communities throughout the country that feature tournaments for youth and adults and identification programs for players hoping to take the next step in their career, all at little to no cost. Guest appearances from legends of the game such as Carlos ‘Pibe” Valderrama and Jorge Campos, brand activations, and more round out an experience that often draws more than a quarter of a million attendees per year.
As part of the FSV portfolio, Alianza de Futbol and JUGOtv will leverage relationships with organizations such as Major League Soccer and US Soccer Federation to expand opportunities for its participants.
“We’re beyond excited to join the FSV team,” said Joaquin Escoto, Managing Director of Alianza de Futbol. “The future of soccer in America is so bright, and we’re thrilled to be joining FSV on their mission to ensure all communities are part of that future. FSV are the perfect partners to help amplify our impact in bringing the Hispanic community closer to the most important organizations in American soccer.”
Additionally, FSV’s unrivaled creative, American soccer storytelling and strategic capabilities will provide Alianza de Futbol a greater platform to evangelize their transformative work in grassroots soccer, while also connecting them to new brands and advertising agencies.
New initiatives that expand upon Alianza de Futbol, both on-and-off the field, will be announced by FSV in the forthcoming months.
Australia head into the Second Test in Melbourne, as favourites to go 2-0 up in the four Test series. India will struggle to recover from their loss in Adelaide and their captain Virat Kohli is set to return home for the remainder of the series.
After being in control of the match, India were woeful in their second innings to be bowled out for a record low of 36; their lowest total in 60 years of Test cricket, surpassing the 42 they made against England at Lords in 1974.
India are expected to make several changes to their side for the Second Test in Melbourne. Mohammad Shami will miss the remainder of the series, after fracturing his arm in Adelaide. KL Rahul is expected to replace Prithvi Shaw at the top of the order, with Rohit Sharma not available until the 3rd Test.
Shubman Gill is expected to get the nod for Kohli’s number four slot, while Mohammed Siraj is tipped to come in for Shami. Siraj had an excellent warm-up game in the lead-up to the First Test, and his pace and bounce suit the MCG wicket.
2020 might not have had the usual quantity of sports, leading to interest in things like Belarussian football, table tennis, and the U.S. elections. Here are the five sports stories that interested you the most in 2020.
AOC leads odds for 2024 Presidential Candidates
Even before Biden beat Trump, some punters’ attention was already turned to 2024. New York Congresswoman Alexandria Occasion-Cortez (AOC) emerged as the bookmakers favourite to challenge for the White House in 2024. The New York congresswoman has the name recognition to challenge for the top job, according to bookmakers.
Nothing major to report in the sports and entertainment today, but we wanted to draw attention to the major upswing in games coming to the forefront. Going into the weekend, the first this year to feature Saturday NFL games, and the 2020-21 NBA season starting on Tuesday, we suddenly have a lot to look forward to in the sports world.
This weekend marks the final Thursday night game of the season as the NFL shifts into its weekend heavy schedule. The Los Angeles Chargers (+ 3 1/2) took down the Las Vegas Raiders in that matchup last night on Fox and NFL Network. The Thursday game will shift to a Friday matinee for Week 16. Both Week 15 and Week 16 will feature multiple Saturday games as well, with both having day and night matchups. Monday Night Football, however, remains on ESPN over the next two weeks. Finally, Week 17 hosts its full schedule on Sunday, as the league traditionally closes the season the same day for all teams.
Of course, Wild Card Weekend and the Divisional Round subsequently follow, both having Saturday and Sunday games. Point being, the NFL is mixing up its schedule to spread games across the next few weeks, so chances are when you flip on the TV any given weekend, you will have an NFL game to watch.
College Football sees a transition from conference championship games to bowl match ups next week, so NCAAF is there as well. The Power Five championships are as follows:
Pac-12: Oregon vs. 13-USC – 12/17 at 8PM EST
Big Ten: 14-Northwestern vs. 4-Ohio State – 12/19 at 12PM EST
Big 12: 10-Oklahoma vs. 6-Iowa State – 12/19 at 12PM EST
ACC 3-Clemson vs. 2-Notre Dame – 4:00PM EST
SEC 7-Florida vs. 1-Alabama – 8:00PM EST
All the great football leads into our biggest development: the NBA regular season’s return this coming Tuesday, December 22. Opening night features a Warriors vs. Nets early contest, followed by the Lakers and Clippers. With the league trying to cram a 72-game schedule into the coming months, we will see more back-to-back sets of games as well as “baseball series.”
In the latter format, teams will play each other multiple nights in a row. This style is uncommon in a normal NBA season, but the new schedule promises an abundance of NBA games throughout the week while you wait for football. Wednesdays and Fridays will be particularly packed with the requisite ESPN/ABC nationally televised packages.
And similar to football, the NBA is piggybacked by the college schedule, which is now entering its full swing of conference play. Check for those games to be typically packed on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays on ESPN, FS1, and regional conference networks.
TL;DR: We shoot into the new year with a very healthy dose of live sporting events. Before you look up, we will have hockey and later baseball back, returning to a full slate of the four major American team sports. Get excited for the action packed weeks to come.
The house always wins in Las Vegas unless that house belongs to the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders. On track for a playoff appearance this year, the team hosted the LA Chargers at its brand-new Allegiant Stadium for Thursday Night Football last night and to say that things didn’t go as planned would be an understatement. On both sides, errors and miscues mounted until the game was forced into overtime, and it was the LA squad that managed to squeak by to take the win.
The Chargers set the pace of the game initially, moving out in front as they shocked the Raiders and football fans alike. However, with the Raiders turning to backup quarterback Marcus Mariota to replace an injured Derek Carr, Las Vegas bounced back late in the game to tie the score at 24. Carr had left earlier due to a groin injury and Mariota gave everything he had, completing 17 of 28 for 226 yards and even scoring a touchdown. His coup de grace was a 75-yard touchdown drive that forced the tie and took 11 minutes off the clock.
With only about six minutes left in regulation, the Chargers electrified their bolts and mounted an offensive rebound to try for the go-ahead score. However, rookie quarterback Justin Herbert couldn’t quite get it done as the lightning dissipated and an attempted field goal by Marcus Badgley went wide left. That drive would later be completely overshadowed by Herbert’s OT performance.
As the Raiders looked to lock up the game in regulation, Mariota was back in action. However, an interception in the red zone forced the Raiders to draw up short, giving the Chargers one more shot at taking the victory in regulation. That shot missed its mark, though, as a clumsy offense and poor clock management stopped the team from reaching the end zone. Having to try once again to rely on Badgley’s foot for a field goal, the Chargers were, once again, left hanging.
It will possibly be looked back upon as a pivotal week in the English Premier League, with first and second meeting each other at Anfield and Chelsea proving that perhaps more than one wheel on their bandwagon could do with tightening up.
Manchester United got another comeback win against Sheffield United, Arsenal stopped the rot but still had a man sent off in their 1-1 home draw with Southampton,
Let’s take a closer look at the drama that took place at Molineux and Anfield.
A renewal of rivalries at Old Trafford, a title race flashback at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, and a potentially toxic tussle at Goodison Park. Let’s look at three superb games in potential and pick some sportsbetting tips out from the full English Premier League schedule.
Everton vs. Arsenal (Saturday, 5.30pm GMT kick-off)
This could be Mikel Arteta’s last game in charge of Arsenal if The Gunners lose it. Everton, who come into the game on the back of two quality victories without conceding against Chelsea and Leicester City, could put the North London side to the sword at Goodison Park.
Arteta has a massive problem on his hands. Arsenal sit 15th in the Premier League on the back of a run of seven defeats in 11 games, with players such as Granit Xhaka and Gabriel sent off in recent games, are missing key personnel against a very threatening, physical side in The Toffees. Under Carlo Ancelotti, the blue half of Merseyside is enjoying some sort of 1980’s renaissance. While they sit 5th, they are going to be dreaming of the Champions League and Arsenal will have to be at their best t get anything out of the game.
It’s the final UFC event of a wacky 2020 on Saturday night from the organization’s Apex facility in Las Vegas – no doubt, the UFC is hoping it can start staging events at worldwide arenas in front of fans early in 2021 – with a Fight Night card headlined by a non-title welterweight matchup between Americans Stephen Thompson and Geoff Neal.
Originally, this card was to be headlined by a welterweight fight between Leon Edwards and Khamzat Chimaev, yet both of those guys tested positive for COVID-19. The UFC is now targeting them to fight on January 20 at Fight Island in Abu Dhabi.
The welterweight champion is Kamaru Usman, and the 37-year-old Thompson is ranked No. 5 in the division with a record of 15-4-1. Thompson is a former professional kickboxer with an unbeaten record in that sport and once ranked No. 1 in Chuck Norris’ World Combat League.
The National Basketball Retired Players Association (NBRPA) today announced the numbers for the first three months of the expansion and launch of Legends Media & Entertainment (LME), a multifaceted storytelling platform producing, distributing and quantifying the wide reaching stories of many of the NBA and WNBA’s biggest stars. In three months LME in both audio and video has drawn almost 600,000 views and listens, more than three times the combined numbers of audio and video around the players in the previous nine months. Viewers and listeners have come from over 20 countries, and have enjoyed content from some of the most unique storytellers in the history of professional basketball. Athletes First Partners represents the NBRPA in its marketing endeavors and is working on engaging with brands on the platform as well.
“Basketball is a team sport, and by unifying efforts under the LME brand, we have been able to start building an audience, and a destination that fans from around the world are enjoying,” said NBRPA President and CEO Scott Rochelle. “The first three months have shown that consistency is key, and now that the season is upon us, we are expecting the concept to continue to grow both in content and in audience with our players, some of the most identifiable and engaged athletes and personalities anywhere.”
The NBRPA represents over 1,000 former NBA and WNBA players, making it the largest agency of its kind in basketball. This has allowed for direct access to players for opportunities domestically and internationally. Some of the most popular segments to date have included sessions with hoist Trill Withers talking with Charles Barkley, Bill Walton, Grant Hill and many others. The content can be seen, and heard at https://www.legendsofbasketball.com/legendslive/
Some of the key unified elements of LME include:
Legends Magazinewhich debuted in 2018 and is the official publication for NBA and WNBA Legends. Produced quarterly, Legends Magazine has featured cover stories about NBRPA Director Caron Butler, Jerry Stackhouse, Elton Brand, Jamal Mashburn and “The Knuckleheads” – Quentin Richardson and Darius Miles. Each issue is delivered to all former players, active players, coaches, stakeholders, influencers and league officials worldwide.
Legends Studios also debuted in 2018 with the launch of original live-action and animated short videos and two podcasts, the All-Access Legends Podcast and On Deck with Scott Rochelle. In April 2020, Legends Live, a weekly web series broadcasted to multiple social media platforms featuring live conversations with NBA and WNBA Legends, was added to the Legends Studios portfolio. In addition to 32 standard episodes, Legends Live also covered the 2020 WNBA Draft and ESPN’s The Last Dance with live commentary from Legends. Last week, media personality Tyler Johnson, aka Trill Withers joined the LME team as host of Legends Live, where he will spend time with many of the game’s most successful and dynamic personalities and business people. Johnson will also be a key contributor to Legends Magazine, the All-Access Legends Podcastand the NBRPA’s social media strategy and content.
To follow along with LME content from the NBRPA, find them on social media at @NBAalumni on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and Twitch or on Facebook at NBA Alumni.
Verizon Media, the global media and technology company and Entain plc (LSE: ENT), the international sports-betting and gaming operator (formerly known as GVC Holdings), today announced a global innovation alliance to develop new opportunities across interactive sports and entertainment. Entain brands include Ladbrokes, bwin, PartyPoker, and BetMGM in the United States, which is co-owned with MGM Resorts.
The new alliance coincides with initial findings from new research for Entain by YouGov, revealing that the use of technology is increasingly shaping consumer behaviours in gaming and entertainment around the world, notably in the United States and Australia. Social media has become central to consumer enjoyment, with new immersive experiences, driven by virtual reality and 5G, accelerating growth of both gaming and e-sports.
Verizon Media and Entain will collaborate to develop a first-of-its-kind highly immersive proof of concept virtual reality experience, that will combine live sports viewing with interactive layers of sports data and gaming. Consumers will be able to participate in sports events, check data, socialise with friends, and place bets on Entain platforms.
Additionally, Entain will work closely with Verizon Media to develop concepts for new formats with emerging technologies like 5G, virtual reality, and augmented reality to bring the best experiences in immersive content and gaming to sports betting and gambling. Along with betting on the Entain platforms on live streaming sports events, the goal is to create realistic, immersive experiences for sports fans, such as being in the stadium, participating in play, competing and betting on outcomes on the Entain platforms.
“To win in the future we need to understand where consumers will be in five, ten years’ time and work with other global businesses also investing in that,” said Shay Segev, CEO of Entain. “We envisage consumers meeting at a game with friends, who could in fact be elsewhere, using virtual reality headsets to watch, interact and share the experience together and, potentially, compete between themselves at half time or feel like they’re on the pitch with the players.”
“This new alliance takes the collaboration between our two companies to a new level and will allow us both to maximize new opportunities across sports-betting, content and entertainment,” said Guru Gowrappan, CEO, Verizon Media.
“Together, we are building the next-generation of content experiences for sports and gaming fans. Our world-first 5G-enabled production studios in LA and London, creative technology teams and Verizon Media’s Immersive platform, that enables extended reality (XR) content to be created and distributed across digital channels at scale, allow partners like Entain to bring next-level immersive and interactive experiences to their customers.”
The collaboration builds on an existing successful relationship between Yahoo Sports, part of Verizon Media, and BetMGM, a joint venture with MGM Resorts through which Entain operates in the United States. BetMGM is integrated throughout Yahoo Sports in the US, and in legal jurisdictions fans can place a bet with BetMGM without leaving the Yahoo Sports app.
The new alliance coincides with first findings of new research for Entain from YouGov, revealing that gaming and entertainment is converging across multiple devices and becoming increasingly interactive, with two-thirds of consumers combining it with social media to increase their enjoyment.
Across all markets, men aged 25 to 39 are the most likely to be innovators or early adopters and are the key audience for e-sports and gaming. Half of e-sports players are in this age group, with most also interacting in social media and more than half enjoying a bet. When it comes to conventional sport, interaction is also increasingly important to this audience, with 31% of 25 to 39-year-old and 34% of over 55’s also engaging digitally to increase their enjoyment of watching sport.
The Bosman ruling made shockwaves when it changed football 25 years ago this week. The relatively unknown player Jean-Marc Bosman went to court to forge a new path for players around Europe.
Running down contracts, going ‘on a Bosman’, signing pre-contract deals in the preceding January, Jean-Marc Bosman gave footballers the ‘player power’ they had always craved and irreversibly changed the path of the most popular sport on Earth.
Since that day, player power has only increased, and many players have gone on a ‘free’ by using the Bosman ruling ever since. We look at the careers of seven of the biggest game-changers.
The NFL usually schedules Saturday games in Weeks 15 and 16 because the college football regular season is over and there’s no football competition on those Saturdays other than some lower-tier bowl games.
However, because the coronavirus pandemic pushed back the start of the 2020 NCAA season, Saturday is when the Power 5 conference championship games will be played (except for the Pac-12). Thus, the two NFL games will have huge competition in terms of TV ratings and betting action at the various sportsbooks.
Neither Saturday NFL game is very attractive as it features a playoff-bound team looking to get the highest seed possible against a club playing out the string. At 4:30 p.m. ET, the Buffalo Bills visit the Denver Broncos. Those teams played an ugly game in Buffalo in Week 12 of the 2019 season, a 20-3 Bills win. Buffalo, which is on the verge of clinching the AFC East for the first time since 1995, is -7 and has covered six straight in the series.
