Jean-Michel Aulas during the Angoulème film festival, September 1, 2020. -

CASTEL / MPP / SIPA

Jean-Michel Aulas had been removed from the steering committee of the call for tenders on Ligue 1 TV rights, before finally being included in the last meetings.

Today, while the Mediapro group refused to pay its second draft of 172 million euros in early October and wants to renegotiate the purchase price (814 million euros per year for four years), the president of OL believe in an interview with

Le

Parisien

that the system provided for by the LFP to manage this file has "a very significant weakness".

If he does not speak of "error", the fact of not asking for a bank guarantee is problematic, according to him.

He takes the example of UEFA, which makes operators pay a deposit.

"When you have a contract of over 800 million euros over four years, that's 3.2 billion, if you have 10% of" deposit ", that allows you to see the first six months coming.

The fact of not having either bank guarantees, or "deposit", it becomes a flagrant weakness, even a tragedy for French football, "he explains.

Hearings at the National Assembly to settle the LFP-Mediapro conflict?

via @ 20minutesSport https://t.co/qJQeik0c7y

- 20 Minutes Sport (@ 20minutesSport) October 14, 2020

According to JMA, Mediapro's financial situation did not deteriorate overnight.

He believes that there was something before that the LFP should have seen.

But more than rehashing what happened, the Lyon president wants to see further.

He thinks that the sale of TV rights must change.

"A unique offer at an attractive price"

“Free is setting up.

Amazon has acquired rights in England and Germany.

UEFA is also in talks with Alibaba.

GAFAs can come into the game or large global distribution companies, like Netflix, which have the capabilities to reach large audiences, Aulas explains.

They will change the rules.

But you have to find a much lower price.

The idea I want to defend is that you need a Spotify for football or a Deezer for football, you need a unique offer with an attractive price and that the public no longer has to wonder on which channel is the match.

"

This is an interesting lead.

The classic model of a monthly subscription to receive only one channel, and therefore only have access to its matches, does indeed seem obsolete.

The Téléfoot channel, which targets 3.5 million subscribers to make the investment profitable, currently only has some 300,000, according to various media.

BeIN Sports had barely reached that figure of 3.5 million after five years, with a much larger offer and a lower price.

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  • Jean-Michel Aulas

  • TV rights

  • Mediapro

  • League 1

  • Soccer

  • Sport