Ligue 1 TV rights: will Canal+ throw in the towel? Maxime Saada responds to Vincent Labrune

The end of an era for French football? While the new call for tenders for the broadcasting rights of Ligue 1 during the 2024-2028 seasons will be launched on September 12, the participation of the Canal+ group is still uncertain. A situation which led the president of the Professional Football League Vincent Labrune to declare to The Team a few weeks ago that the encrypted channel would not be in the game.

Annoyed by this speech, Maxime Saada, president of Canal +, responded bluntly and reaffirmed the position of his group on the rights of the elite of French football.

The LFP aims for one billion euros

It must be said that the LFP is preparing to ask for a tidy sum for the broadcasting rights of Ligue 1 during these four seasons. Vincent Labrune would thus envisage “global audiovisual revenues of around one billion euros”against 624 million euros per season currently.

A high price that Labrune justifies: “It may be a little optimistic, but we have a significant margin for progress internationally. In France, it’s a little more complicated, especially when the major player, Canal +, does not wish to participate”.

It was enough for Maxime Saada to answer him sharply, always with our colleagues from The Team : “Nothing surprises me anymore with the LFP and certainly not this billion dollar obsession which led to the Mediapro disaster, with fanciful comparisons with what has been achieved in other territories”did he declare.

A deal with Prime Video?

And the chairman of the management board of Canal+ to continue: “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 is to wonder if there would not already be an agreement with a broadcaster or a platform”.

A barely veiled reference to Amazon Prime Video. The streaming platform already broadcasts eight of the ten matches each day (Canal+ broadcasting the remaining two) and intends to pocket the entire competition. A strong symbol of this expected hegemony, Prime Video will broadcast the two matches between PSG and OM during the 2023-2024 season.

Maxime Saada provided details on the ongoing discussions at Canal+ regarding Ligue 1 TV rights: “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”.

If he remains evasive on Canal+’s final participation in this call for tenders, Maxime Saada adds that a formal meeting has taken place with the LFP since Labrune’s declaration… and that his group has always had the ability to do without L1 TV rights.

The poker game therefore seems far from over.