French football is heading towards the wall. If he hasn't already stuck in it. The interview this morning with Jean-Pierre Caillot (president of Stade de Reims) in the newspaper L'Equipe confirms this. For him, the championship could even resume without a broadcaster…
A surprising interview. That's an understatement. In the pages of L'Equipe , the boss of Stade de Reims analyzes the TV rights situation , he who is part of the college of Ligue 1 presidents at the Professional Football League (LFP).
To sum up the situation: the League has no concrete or viable solution on the table. With the official start of the French championship just one month and eight days away, can we expect a final decision by the end of the week? " I hope so, but to decide, we'll need to have some options. Which, as we speak, isn't the case yet ," clarifies Jean-Pierre Caillot.
The president of Reims goes even further: " If we have to resume the season without a TV channel for one or two matchdays, we'll accept it. People will go to the stadium to watch the matches . And we'll be patient. I think it's a mistake to start something in a rush. "
The mistake would be to start Ligue 1 without a broadcaster . French football is paying the price for its lack of spectacle, the departure of stars Messi, Neymar and Mbappé in two years, the lack of competition to fight for the title, the low level of OM (the only credible competitor to PSG in the hearts of fans) for years, and the disastrous decision to give the rights to Mediapro in 2018.
In this interview, Jean-Pierre Caillot suggests there is " a third option with BeIN Sports, " even though the channel hasn't made a single offer since November. Is an option without an offer really an option at all? Similarly, he considers Canal+ an enemy of French football, despite having kept it afloat for years. Canal+ has successfully reinvented itself in recent years, revitalizing itself with the rights to Formula 1 and the Champions League.
Among the proposals to scale back the system, Jean-Pierre Caillot suggests abandoning the costly VAR (video assistant referee) . A step backward. Going back to cycling after driving a sports car is all the rage these days. Yet VAR has statistically proven its effectiveness, drastically reducing the number of refereeing errors in key moments of a match.
Jean-Pierre Caillot offered no mea culpa, particularly regarding the League's haphazard management (LFP headquarters, salaries, bonuses, etc.), but instead reminded everyone that they would have to tighten their belts . A strange way of thinking.
Certainly, a business manager has the right to restructure his business as he sees fit. There, we are talking about restructuring French football, supervised as we know by the FFF, therefore the State. Good luck. Clubs could perhaps already take care of their payroll in relation to their results or the colossal number of professional contracts? Shouldn't imposing a salary cap be on the agenda since we have to tighten our belts?
Finally, Jean-Pierre Caillot buries the DAZN trail, the streaming content channel of businessman Len Blavatnik, supported by numerous investors. “ Guarantees should be
much more certain than those we have today. It would be necessary to have guarantees from the major shareholder, which is not the cas. Today, the guarantees provided do not satisfy club presidents. »
If club presidents don't have access to the major shareholder, who have they been talking to for months? Since DAZN remains one of the rare chains to have actually submitted an interesting offer from 2023.
Also read on Entrevue.fr regarding Ligue 1 TV rights:
No outcome for French football?
Max (Warner Bros), the surprise?
