Before the coronavirus health crisis, the presidents of Ligue 1 clubs dreamed of a summer 2020 more cicada than ant. The most daring, anticipating this windfall, had even released the checkbook during the last transfer market. Finally France would catch up with its Spanish, German and English neighbors thanks to its record TV rights of € 1.15 billion per season for the period 2020-2024. An increase of 54% compared to the previous call for tenders, which owes a lot to the arrival of a new player, the Spanish group Mediapro, for a sum close to 800 million euros annually.
But French professional football will have to wait before putting on the clothes of the new rich. Are they his size, by the way? While no one can blame its leaders for having ignored this global pandemic in their forecasts, this crisis reveals the structural weaknesses of the French model. And its divisions too.
An intermediate championship
When the president of Olympique Lyonnais, Jean-Michel Aulas, talks about from March 13 in The world the hypothesis"A white season" and asks to think about this possibility, his colleagues fall on him. Since then, they have kept repeating (with the exception of Denis Le Saint, president of Stade Brestois) that the Ligue 1 season must be saved. They would almost make it a national cause.
It is mainly a question of recovering the TV rights (almost 150 million euros) that Canal + and BeIN Sports refuse to pay for the last installment of the season
For the beauty of sport? Before allowing Paris to win a new title or Toulouse to perhaps establish a record of defeats, it is above all a question of recovering the TV rights (almost 150 million euros) that Canal + and BeIN Sports refuse to pay for the last installment of the season and save the furniture. The presidents even sent to the front Nasser Al-Khelaïfi with his double cap of boss of the PSG and BeIN Media Group. When the house burns down, we look elsewhere for the risk of conflict of interest.
Failing to leave a club on the floor – this red rag agitated to dramatize the situation -, this crisis weakens a hexagonal football which imagines itself more beautiful and bigger than it really is and often lives on credit. Seen from France, Ligue 1 belongs to the five major championships with the Premier League, La Liga, the Bundesliga and Serie A.
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