Relegated to the background on the Ligue 1 TV rights market since the arrival of Amazon, Canal Plus could, in the long term, no longer broadcast any matches of the French football championship…
In just over two months, the call for tenders for Ligue 1 TV rights will be officially launched for the period 2024-2028. If Amazon should logically be in the game, since the Ligue 1 Pass is a success on Prime Video, Canal+ could pass its turn. In any case, this is what Vincent Labrune, the president of the LFP, had suggested at the beginning of the month: “Aiming for around one billion euros, even if the macro-economic and financial context is delicate, it is perhaps a bit optimistic, but we have a significant margin for progress internationally. In France, it is a little more complicated, especially when the major player, Canal+, does not wish to participate.. A statement that did not really please Maxime Saada, who suspects the League of a stab in the back as negotiations between broadcasters and the LFP approach.
“Already an agreement with a broadcaster or platform? »
Maxime Saada, on the rights of the L1: “To wonder if the LFP would not already have a broadcaster”
The president of Canal+ says he is very surprised by Vincent Labrune’s statement on the encrypted channel’s non-participation in the call for tenders https://t.co/BJ5euIu6xr pic.twitter.com/sXfNaDEc8h
— THE TEAM (@theteam) June 29, 2023
“Nothing surprises me anymore with the LFP and certainly not this billion dollar obsession which led to the Mediapro disaster. What really surprised me was that Vincent Labrune announced it and at the same time declared that Canal+ would not participate. It’s still a first! When you combine these two pieces of information, it makes you wonder if there isn’t already an agreement with a broadcaster or a platform? That’s what came to mind when I read that statement. I don’t know what allows Vincent Labrune to say that. Only two other people at Canal+ intervene with me directly on this subject. None spoke, even internally. Vincent Labrune contacted me to offer me informal meetings, which I no longer wish to do. I saw where they had led me… To a totally unbalanced agreement for Canal+. But we had a first formal meeting with the LFP since this declaration. We have always had the ability to do without the L1. Even if we hadn’t managed to find an agreement with beIN Sports, it would have been very difficult but we would have recovered. Whatever the hard blow that can happen to us, our teams are able to adapt.detailed, in L’Equipe, the president of Canal +, who would not have nightmares if the encrypted channel were to not broadcast L1 for the first time in its history from next season…
