French soccer’s LFP body, and global sports streaming service DAZN have extended the deadline for talks on a potential new channel to cover the top-tier Ligue 1 in 2025-26.
The deadline for discussions between the pair, who have had a tempestuous and rocky relationship over the last 12 months (during which DAZN has been the main live domestic broadcaster for the top-tier Ligue 1), has now been extended to June 15.
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That deadline had, up until the extension, been due to expire tomorrow (May 31).
It has been reported that this decision comes amidst a lack of overall progress at the talks, with the project regarding a new channel to show the top division of French soccer being headed up by Nicolas de Tavernost, the general director at the LFP Media commercial subsidiary of the body.
The talks come as another chapter in a year of calamity for the LFP regarding its broadcast rights.
DAZN had originally picked up five-season domestic Ligue 1 rights – eight matches per week, out of the nine in total from that 18-team league – just before the start of the 2024-25 season. Overall, the annual value of the LFP’s domestic deals with DAZN and Qatar-based broadcaster BeIN Sports last season was around €400 million ($453.2 million).
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By GlobalDataHowever, since then, DAZN has regularly withheld rights money from the LFP – citing a variety of factors, including the LFP failing to take necessary measures against digital piracy – which forced that body to take legal action against DAZN to eventually secure the funds.
This eventually led to mediation between the two parties, which in turn resulted in an eventual agreement that the DAZN-LFP tie-up would be terminated at the end of 2024-25, after just one campaign.
At the time of the termination agreement, it was then reported that DAZN was in pole position to work with the LFP on launching an in-house channel in 2025-26 – if this happens, DAZN is expected to forego the €100 million fee it owes (for breaking the rights contract).
Vincent Labrune, president of the LFP, has previously said, on the subject of the league launching its own channel: “We have to move forward on our own.”
Over the last half-decade or so, the main major soccer leagues in Europe have all been mulling over the right way in which to launch their own channels or streaming services – as yet, none have done so for a domestic audience.
Overall, the LFP domestic media rights saga that engulfed the summer of 2024 was disastrous, and as many as eight second-tier Ligue 2 clubs were said to have been at risk of bankruptcy had a deal not been reached.
The LFP tanked its domestic broadcast rights outlook by overestimating the value of its package, resulting in this season marking the first time since 1984 that French broadcasting heavyweight Canal Plus is not airing live Ligue 1 matches.
In terms of DAZN's concerns over piracy, meanwhile, an LFP-backed report late last year seemed to back up its concerns, as it was found that 37% of those who had watched Ligue 1 action during the first few months of 2024-25 had done so illegally.
