Quick post to get you a little pumped this morning. Last week I told you how you can Play Some Fantasy Serie A (Italian Soccer) at Serie A Live. Now, Serie A Live just released a new promo video for its site. It’s simple, fun, and should get you pumped (at least a little):

Hope you enjoyed that, and don’t forget to check back later today for some articles.

Fantasy sports know no borders, and today I will take you to Italy. Serie A Live is a fantasy soccer league focusing on the top Italian soccer league, the Serie A. The site is the brainchild of Serie A-lover Vince Cullotta and is one of the very first independent fantasy Serie A sites out there, with only Yahoo! and ESPN among the big fantasy sites playing in the Italian soccer market.

My favorite part is that Serie A Live has created a challenge for next season with its Serie A Champions League. The top 30 teams will compete in a champions league next year. This little nuance will keep players playing once they are out of the hunt for the top spot. Three months into the Serie A season, of the 219 players signed up, about 179 actively playing, which is an impressive percentage. In addition, the site also features live scoring, which is very high-end feature and keeps fantasy players regularly engaged.

A point about the internationalization of fantasy sports. Think back to about 1990 when the fantasy industry was full of little niche sites creeping up everywhere. Ultimately, those sites merged, emerged, failed, were acquired, and became part of the fantasy sites that we grow and love today. Well, for the rest of the world, it is 1990 all over. Except, this time around the new fantasy companies have the playbook from the past twenty years. There is no reason to make the same mistakes and to not do what you not works.

When I see a new site like Serie A Live investing in the features that are essential to running a successful game, like live scoring, and ways to innovate the game, it gets me excited. Cullotta is investing in making a top product. Once the market demand for fantasy Serie A grows (it will, just as fantasy EPL has grown), Serie A Live will be in a great position to capitalize and gain those new customers.

Congratulations to Vince on the site launch, and good luck with Serie A Live!

I love reading data, which partly why I have always loved fantasy sports. Within the industry, getting data on international participation is always the hardest. When I read about fantasy gaining in India, it mentioned the growth of fantasy English Premier League (EPL) in India, I could not help but to get excited. Currently, over 38,000 Indians are playing in the official fantasy EPL site, while another 10,000 are playing in ESPN Fantasy EPL League, and another 6,000 are playing the Fantasy Champions League.

50,000 fantasy players is not exactly enough to say that fantasy sports has gone mainstream, but it is a very significant start. In a country with over 1.2B people and a burgeoning middle class, there is definitely a possibility that India may be the next big fantasy market.

The key to figuring out which fantasy sports will do well in international markets is figuring out which real sports do well in those markets. It is highly unlikely that football, baseball, and basketball will be the big fantasy sports. More than likely, soccer, cricket, and rugby will be the dominant fantasy sports overseas.

Fut11.com plans to launch itself in the near future. While it is getting ready to launch, it is looking for a few good logo ideas. In fact, it is currently hosting a logo contest for the a fantasy soccer logo. The designer of the winning logo will in a prize of $295.

All I can tell you about Fut11.com is that the domain was registered on September 3, 2009, and the company is based on Portugal. The name is short and sweet, and makes sense for the product.

I do like the idea of making you logo a public contest, because it helps generate some pre-launch buzz for the site. Personally, I like the logo on the left.

Good luck to all designers!

You have to appreciate the British approach to advertising–it gets your attention. As you might be able to determine from the woman on the left, she is promoting the Daily Star’s Fantasy Football game, which is now open for sign-ups.

This time of year, while most fantasy football players are gearing up for the upcoming NFL season, there are a few fantasy football players that are gearing up for the start of the English Premier League, and the launch of a different kind of fantasy football.

The Daily Star game offers a top prize of £50,000, ($82,600) with three teams costing £10 ($16.50). It is a simple salary cap game where you pick a starting roster of 11 players utilizing a £100M salary cap. Score points as players contribute to their teams. If they play well, you do well. They end up riding the pine, you suffer. Pretty simple.

English Premier League Fantasy Football is growing and you can even find up-to-the-minute soccer player news on sites like RotoWire these days. It is growing market, and possibly the next great fantasy sport.

Additional Coverage:

• http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/view/89617/FANTASY-FOOTBALL-IS-BACK-/