Paris (AFP)

Public reduced to the extreme, even absent, business customers also very affected, additional weight of the health protocol: the shortfall is expected to be considerable for Roland-Garros at the time of the Covid-19.

With direct implications for French tennis, very largely irrigated by the Parisian Grand Slam.

One figure sums up the "Roland-Garros dependence" of the French Tennis Federation (FFT): on its budget of 325 million euros in 2019 - which makes it the largest of French sports federations -, more than 255 million euros come from his prestigious tournament.

Or nearly 80%.

The organizers make no secret of it, this 2020 edition, exceptionally rescheduled in the fall under the constraint of the Covid-19, which opens on Sunday, will not reach these heights.

"We are organizing this tournament knowing that we will have less revenue", admitted the president of the FFT Bernard Giudicelli at the beginning of September.

What will remain then of this financial windfall?

When the gauge was still fixed at 11,500 daily spectators at the most at the beginning of September, the director of Roland-Garros Guy Forget counted on "products divided by two" and evaluated the shortfall between 130 and 140 million euros.

But the situation has deteriorated even further since then.

Concretely, revenue department, two items mainly toast: ticketing and services related to business customers (hospitality).

Each weighs 18% of total income.

- "Lost paradise -

Far from the some 520,000 spectators welcomed at Porte d'Auteuil in 2019, Roland-Garros still hopes to receive 75,000 throughout the Paris fortnight - 5,000 per day - despite the new meeting restrictions announced Wednesday evening by the Minister of Health Olivier Véran, in this case a thousand people in Paris, classified in "enhanced alert zone" like ten other large French cities.

"A consultation between the Prefect of police of Paris and the elected officials" must decide within 48 hours, then specified Mr. Véran.

"Roland-Garros is also a paradise for hospitality, with lodges, business meals, etc. It is certain that this is a service that has been greatly affected, impossible to maintain at the previous level, and you have contracts that break ", complete with AFP Lionel Maltese, professor of sports economics at the University of Aix-Marseille and member of the steering committee of the FFT in charge of economic development.

At the end of the chain, the sale of derivatives (4%) will also plunge.

In this gloomy climate, the good news for the Parisian Grand Slam is that its first income item, TV rights, which accounts for more than a third (36%, about 80 ME), is holding up.

Expenditure department, added to the shifting weight of the health protocol to be deployed and adapted according to the decisions of the French authorities.

As for the "prize money", that is to say the bonuses of result for the players and players, the organizers moderate it, but maintained at a high level, at "a little more than 38 million euros, of the 'around 90% of the previous year, "Forget compares.

- "Addiction" -

With this inevitable hole in the fund, what consequences for French tennis?

"This is a disaster-stricken edition, and a disaster-stricken year for French tennis. It is the example of a virtuous, fairly unique model, where the revenue from Roland-Garros normally flows to the whole of tennis, which s 'self-financing when things are going well and which collapses there with the health context, "Christophe Lepetit, economist at the Center for Law and Economics of Sport (CDES) in Limoges, told AFP.

To overcome the exceptional lag of the tournament, the FFT had recourse to the mechanism of the loan guaranteed by the State and to a major loan from its main partner BNP Paribas, explains Maltese.

"The federation is not at all in danger, it has had income, it has made investments, it owns a lot of things, including Roland-Garros" and the Masters 1000 in Paris, "it is an asset enormous ", develops the academic, who insists on the fact that she has not made any dismissals, unlike her American counterpart (USTA).

But "where there was a significant profit, between 60 and 80 million euros each year, today, in the Covid system, we barely manage to balance, even we lose a little money", he continues .

"The federation used to have room for maneuver to be able to invest in many projects. The question that will arise is how we will review the charges to compensate", adds Maltese, referring to " investments that will not be able to be made as before ”, to“ concentrate on essential projects ”and the need to strengthen management control.

"This dependence becomes a concern with the (health) context. It should not last too long", underlines Lepetit.

"Roland-Garros 2021 is coming quickly."

© 2020 AFP