Vientiane Throne of Civilization

Chapter 1838 Everyone Likes Making Money

"Football can't be liked by everyone, but there's one thing that I believe 99 percent of people will like."

On a new day, inside a side hall, Zhou Xu was discussing future plans with the newly appointed head of the Football Association.

Zhou Xu does indeed attach great importance to the work related to football, but after all, he is the ruler of a country, and there are many other things waiting for him to do. He can't spend all his time dealing with this.

Therefore, he needs a suitable person to act as the executor and faithfully carry out his plan.

"Your Majesty, please enlighten me."

"Make money."

"what?"

"Ninety-nine percent of the people in this world probably like making money!"

"..."

The FIFA official agreed with this statement, but was hesitant to respond.

In their Great Zhou Dynasty, anyone too fond of making money was invited for tea by the Inspection Department...

Zhou Xu, however, didn't care much about the other party's reaction and directly had his personal guards hand over the plan he had already written.

"I plan to launch a new game called 'football lottery,' which basically allows viewers to place bets on the outcome of a match between two teams."

"The most basic thing is to guess which team will win. Going further, you can guess how many goals they will win by, or even the exact score. The higher the difficulty, the higher the odds."

"The specific odds will be adjusted based on the strength of the two teams and even the betting situation on that day."

"Of course, I don't like betting too much, so I set it at two copper coins per bet, and each person can buy a maximum of ten bets."

Clearly, Zhou Xu did not want the situation to escalate to the point where people lost everything and resorted to suicide, as that would undoubtedly have a very negative social impact.

Keep it to a level where you gamble responsibly, and at most lose twenty copper coins. That's about right.

There are many more specific clauses regarding the rules and regulations for football betting. Zhou Xu basically wrote down everything he could think of, and told the FIFA officials to go back and study it slowly.

The important thing now is to make the other party understand your general ideas and plans.

"In order for this football lottery to work, we first need to have each city establish a team, then hold a city league to determine the representative team of each city, then a regional league to determine the regional champion, and then a national final."

"As long as you pay ten copper coins and register, you can form a team. Once you have eleven members, you can sign up to compete."

In order to motivate everyone, bonuses will definitely be provided.

"The prize money for becoming a city representative team is 500 silver coins, the prize money for regional champion is 1,000 silver coins, and the prize money for national champion is 2,000 silver coins. The prize money will be adjusted according to the situation thereafter."

In the Great Zhou Dynasty, one silver coin was equal to one hundred copper coins, while at present, the average monthly income of ordinary people in Black Moon City is basically between two and three silver coins.

Even if it's the city team's 500 silver coins, if it's divided equally among eleven people, even if you round it down, each person would still get 45 silver coins. An ordinary person would have to work for 15 months to earn that much, even if they only earn 3 silver coins a month.

Needless to say, the national champion's two thousand silver coins were divided equally among eleven people. Even after deducting the odd amount, each person would still receive one hundred and eighty-one silver coins, which was sixty months' income. An ordinary person would have to work for five years to earn that much! The temptation was undeniable!

After understanding Zhou Xu's thinking, the FIFA officials quickly got to work.

The news caused an immediate uproar! "Good heavens! Two thousand silver coins?! I could never save that much in my entire life!!"

Earning three silver coins a month doesn't mean you can save three silver coins. After deducting daily expenses, it's considered good if you can save twenty or thirty copper coins.

Two thousand silver coins—it's not an exaggeration to say that you can't save that much in a lifetime.

Just as Zhou Xu said before, everyone likes to make money. When they heard that there was money to be made from playing football, the enthusiasm that had begun to fade instantly exploded.

The FIFA service window was packed with people that day.

The registration fee of ten copper coins was too low. In the blink of an eye, ten more football teams had registered in Black Moon City, and the number was still growing.

However, while registering is easy, maintaining the team is difficult.

Each city responded to the call, and it took time to form a team, so the first football league of their Great Zhou was scheduled to begin in three months.

With the prospect of league matches and prize money, the passion for football has been sustained.

Three months later, a week before the start of the league, after all participating teams completed their registration and draw, and confirmed their match-ups, a new way to play football betting was launched.

The FIFA officials are quite adept at stirring things up. When explaining how football betting works, they gave an extreme example: a major upset, and if you bet on ten matches, the odds are 100 to 1.

Good heavens, twenty copper coins turned into twenty silver coins in the blink of an eye! It was a gamble that turned a bicycle into a motorcycle!

Although the impact of twenty silver coins is far less than that of two thousand silver coins, it has the advantage of a low barrier to entry and does not require them to spend time training. They only need to guess who will win and who will lose in the next match.

Needless to say, football lottery tickets sold out instantly!

Five thousand tickets were sold for the first match of the city league, but more than fifty thousand football lottery tickets were sold, and that number continues to grow.

Two copper coins constitute one bet. In Blackmoon City, no one minds taking a gamble, and many people even buy ten bets at once.

As the game ended, many people at the stadium waved their lottery tickets and screamed with excitement.

"I won! I won! Hahaha!! I bought ten tickets!!!"

Most people who are new to football betting simply guess who will win or lose, and the odds are relatively low.

They probably only earned a dozen or twenty copper coins.

But for the fans who guessed correctly, they did nothing but buy a lottery ticket and easily made money. What could be happier than that?
Those who guessed wrong basically only lost a few copper coins; after all, few people would buy ten bets on their first try.

But each of them started thinking that they must win next time.

This directly led to a surge in discussion surrounding the city league.

After all, if you want to make money by betting, you definitely have to study the two teams participating in the competition and discuss their players' skills, team tactics, and other aspects.

This directly led to a surge of football analysis gurus emerging in Blackmoon City in the following period, each of whom spoke with sound reasoning and solid arguments.

At the same time, looking at the revenue and data from this period, the FIFA officials felt nothing but endless admiration for their emperor.

This method and its effect were something he wouldn't have dared to even imagine before!
(End of this chapter)