THE French Professional Football League is at risk of disappearing from TV screens as they received zero bids for broadcasting rights.
Officials confirmed on Tuesday, that French football’s TV presence is under threat as no one wants to pay the £693million annual fee to stream Ligue 1 and 2 games.
Getty – ContributorThe French Professional Football League is at major risk of disappearing from TV screens[/caption]
The Professional Football League‘s (LFP) longest-standing broadcast partner Canal Plus failed to make an offer for the 2024-29 cycle on Monday.
This forced Ligue 1 to launch the bid on Tuesday without the French TV giants in the hope they can sell the Ligue 1 broadcast rights.
Five bundles were on offer, including the two main bundles for the rights to broadcast games live.
One bundle was worth £459million and included the two biggest matches of the game week plus the fourth-choice fixture.
While the second was worth was worth £234 million to stream the rest of the matches that are not shown by other broadcasters.
However, there were no takers for the current price including Canal Plus, meaning LFP will have to negotiate directly with them and other interested TV services, according to L’Equipe.
LFP officials said: “After having received multiple qualitative offers and guaranteed financial packages on all of the bundles (1-5).
“LFP Media reveals that none of the bundles have been attributed today (Tuesday).
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“As a result, LFP Media is continuing its commercialisation process of the rights to Ligue 1 and postpones the call for candidates for Ligue 2.”
The call for tenders for Ligue 2 rights, was initially scheduled for Thursday 19th and Friday 20th October.
Canal Plus has shown top-flight football in France since the pay TV service launched in 1984.
However, the broadcaster has been in conflict with the LFP since 2020 due to a potential record deal with Spanish company Mediapro.
The bid process for the LFP also came at a stressful time in French football.
As the recent departures of football icons Lionel Messi and Neymar from Paris Saint-Germain have hindered LFP’s chance of boosting the price for TV rights.
And with uncertainty over Kylian Mbappe‘s future in the French capital, Ligue 1 will most need to opt for a modest sum of money to seal a deal.
The relationship between Canal Plus and French football is similar to that between Sky Sports and the Premier League.
In comparison, to the mega-rich Premier League, they sold their three-year cycle broadcast rights for more than £10billion for the 2022-25 cycle.
ReutersFrench football has been suffering since the departure of Messi and Neymar[/caption]