Justice on Tuesday rendered a new decision unfavorable to Canal + in the endless soap opera of Ligue 1 TV rights, ordering it to continue to broadcast and pay for two matches per day of the Championship, according to the judgment of which AFP obtained a copy.
The Paris Commercial Court ruled on Tuesday on the specific part of the sub-license contract linking the encrypted channel to beIN Sports, which provides that Canal + pays its Qatari counterpart the annual bill of 332 million euros, corresponding to 20% of Ligue 1 TV rights. Initial winner, in 2018, of this batch of the L1 call for tenders for the period 2020-2024, beIN Sports had decided to sublicense its rights to Canal+ at the same price, becoming a simple intermediary between the chain of the Vivendi group and the Professional Football League (LFP).
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Since the bankruptcy of the Mediapro group, a former major L1 broadcaster, at the end of 2020, Canal+ has deemed this batch of matches to be overvalued and has sought to get rid of it through multiple legal proceedings, including by attempting to break its sub-license contract and oblige beIN to pay and broadcast the meetings in its place.
But the commercial court ruled on Tuesday that Canal+ was not entitled to terminate its contract with the Qatari channel, ordering it to "
perform all of the obligations prescribed for it by the sub-license contract concluded with beIN
,” according to the decision.
The Nanterre Commercial Court and then the Versailles Court of Appeal had already delivered similar decisions in summary proceedings, in August 2021 and then in March 2022.
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This first instance decision on the merits, which may be appealed, maintains the status quo on the broadcasting of French football, with 20% of the matches on Canal+ and 80% on Amazon, which has recovered the vacant lots of Mediapro at a discount (250 million euros annually) in June 2021. Thursday, Canal + had already been dismissed by the Paris Court of Appeal in parallel proceedings, where it accused the LFP of abuse of a dominant position.
The judicial soap opera of L1 TV rights is now entering a parenthesis, since no decision is expected before the end of 2022. But many assignments continue, most carried out in concert by beIN and Canal against the LFP.
