Paris (AFP)

The sale of a portion of the commercial rights of the Six Nations Tournament to the investment fund CVC Capital Partners, former owner of the Formula 1, would bring 16 million euros per year over 5 years to the French Rugby Federation (FFR) said the latter at the end of its steering committee on Friday.

"At its meeting of the Six Nations Council on July 10, 2019, the Six Nations Committee, as well as its Member Federations, unanimously decided to enter into a period of exclusive negotiations with CVC to build a partnership" explained the Federation.

With this in mind, "the Federations would retain full control of the organization of competitions and will not assign any rights" and "CVC would have the role of exclusive commercial agent of the commercial rights without any prerogative on the sports project", reassured the FFR .

According to the British newspaper The Times, the Six Nations (England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Italy and France) had reached an agreement in September to sell 15% of their commercial CVC Fund, one of the largest in the world.

CVC, which held the majority of the shares of the Formula 1 championship from 2006 to 2016, has already acquired in December 27% of the shares of the first English division of rugby, estimated at 200 million pounds (225 million euros) and had made in March an offer for 30% shares of the Six Nations Tournament, according to the BBC.

The president of World Rugby, the supreme body of world rugby, Brett Gosper, made his concerns in September that "some decisions can be made that are not in the interest of growth or welfare. to be players ".

Florian Grill, opponent of the FFR president Bernard Laporte for the next election in 2020, had issued a similar opinion. "An investment fund buys and sells, we bring rugby into a speculative bubble."

© 2019 AFP