Paris (AFP)
Between Canal +, a favorite with a still uncertain strategy, and new entrants in ambush, the consultation launched by French football for its vacant TV rights will shake the market until February 1, despite an unfavorable context for major investments.
Operators interested in buying the 80% of Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 put back on sale after the withdrawal of the failing broadcaster Mediapro have less than two weeks to submit their offers.
If Canal +, which calls for a call for tenders on all rights, could contest this procedure, the encrypted channel still seems essential.
"The principle of any call for tenders is that surprises are possible. But unlike 2018, the competition is currently almost reduced to nothing", summarizes Pierre Maes, consultant and author of the "Football TV rights business" .
- Favorite channel, but ... -
The encrypted channel is to date the only one to have publicly expressed its interest in the redemption of French football.
It has limited the loss of subscribers in recent months and benefits from an alliance signed in 2019 with beIN Sports, perhaps allowing it to act in concert with the Qatari group on the matter.
"We can almost speak of a monopoly, even a duopoly," confirms Pierre Maes.
But the Vivendi group chain, led by Vincent Bolloré, has a thorn in its side: it is already under contract for the remaining 20% of Ligue 1 at a price negotiated in 2018 (330 million euros per year).
The boss of Canal + Maxime Saada considers this amount "overvalued" in the current context and wishes to return this lot so that a global call for tenders is launched, which raises the fear of new legal battles.
To the point of calling into question the participation of Canal + in the consultation?
- Free channels, a mad hope?
-
The other pay channel still quite active in football, RMC Sport, seems far from the discussions, against the background of withdrawal of its parent company Altice (SFR) in sports rights.
A time cited because having already tried the adventure in 2008, Orange, another telecoms giant, denied to AFP any interest in the purchase of rights.
As for Free, which already has a lot, that of match summaries, for nearly 50 million euros annually, it remains very discreet.
On the other hand, free channels have returned to the charge in recent days, but only to offer their services on a transitional basis and avoid the "black screen" of non-broadcast matches.
TF1 like M6 nevertheless recalled that they were not intended to acquire the rights.
- Amazon points its nose -
Under these conditions, the League could try to attract a new player, as was the case at the end of the 1990s with TPS, in 2011 with beIN Sports, or in 2018 with Mediapro.
Among the potential interested, Amazon is regularly cited.
Frédéric Duval, France director of the online sales platform, did not rule out the possibility of embarking on an interview with BFM Business at the end of 2020, saying he was "interested in everything" without wanting to comment further.
Amazon has indeed started to invest in European football and will broadcast part of the Roland-Garros tennis tournament from 2021 in France.
"They are not going to do + all in +, but they have shown that they are capable of putting up a bill of 100 to 150 million euros per year", explains Arnaud Simon, former boss of Eurosport France.
In the consultation launched Tuesday by the League, lot C, including the three multiplexes of the 19th, 37th and 38th days of the Championship, the two play-offs and the Champions Trophy, looks a bit like the one-off lot obtained by the platform in England , that of the 10 matches of "Boxing Day", the traditional day of the Championship of December 26th.
- DAZN, a little early?
-
Can we expect surprise entrants?
Unlikely in the case of the giants Facebook, Netflix or Apple, say the specialists.
As for the streaming sports platform DAZN (pronounced "Da Zone"), recently launched in France, its offer is for the moment very minimalist, but it is more developed in Italy and Germany.
In the very short term, the bet may seem risky with such a young player on the French market, especially given the Mediapro fiasco, another new entrant ...
"DAZN ticks all the boxes, has a better image than Mediapro, but it is completely penniless," says Pierre Maes.
Before wondering: "The League will risk it to consider that he has the kidneys sufficiently strong?"
© 2021 AFP