ROME (Reuters) - With betting on the next pope frowned upon in the home of the Vatican, thousands of Italians have instead taken to playing "Fantapapa", an online game inspired by the fantasy leagues familiar to sports fans.

International gambling companies, never shy of a marketing opportunity, are offering odds on various candidates to succeed Pope Francis when cardinals meet in a secret conclave from May 7.

In Italy, however, no licensed gambling platform is taking bets on 'papabili', as the papal contenders are known. Fantapapa offers an alternative for those who want some gaming before the white smoke rises.

Players create a team of 11 papal candidates and win points if a team member is mentioned prominently in media within Italy and beyond. Extra points are allocated if one of your picks is elected, with bonuses for correct guesses on other elements such as the name taken by the new pontiff.

"As of now (Cardinal Matteo) Zuppi is the preferred candidate and, notably, most of the followers on our Instagram profile are women," Pietro Pace, one of the creators, told Reuters.

Zuppi, the archbishop of Bologna and the head of the Italian bishops' conference, is a well-known figure in the country.

Pace, an AI architect at Microsoft, and Mauro Vanetti, a video game developer, started working on the platform in February when Francis went into hospital. The game, which is free to play and carries no adverts, went online shortly after he died on April 21, and the number of users approached 60,000 this week.

"There are no prizes, it's just for fun and for the eternal glory," Pace said.

NOVELTY BETS

Betting on the conclave is not illegal in Italy, but it is discouraged.

"In Italy there is no law expressly prohibiting betting on the election of the pope," explained Nicola Tani, head of specialist media outlet Agipronews.

"However, the Customs Agency, which authorises the subject of bets in advance, has informally asked gaming licensees to avoid offering odds on the election of the pope, as is the case for Italian political elections," Tani added.

For gambling companies elsewhere, bets on the pope fall into the novelty category of one-off events that cannot be judged by conventional statistics or sporting form. Sums wagered are relatively small.

On Polymarket, a blockchain-based prediction market, the "Who will be the next Pope?" market has seen a modest $10 million in total volume. By comparison, a possible Fed decision on interest rates in May has seen almost $30 million in bets.

Favourites are starting to emerge.

"There's already plenty of speculation on the next Pope, and currently we make the Vatican Secretary of State, Pietro Parolin, our favourite at 9/4," said Lee Phelps, spokesperson for British-based gambling group William Hill.

He added that "Luis Antonio Tagle is second in our market at 3/1 and would become the first Asian Pope in history, while Matteo Zuppi and Peter Turkson are both priced at 6/1."

Tagle is from the Philippines. Turkson is from Ghana and would be the first Black pope in modern history.