Ligue 1 embroiled in media rights disaster with DAZN

Overseas, flagship French soccer league, Ligue 1, finds itself in a media rights nightmare.

The topflight league in the French soccer pyramid, Ligue 1 is at risk of losing out on a substantial portion of its media rights revenue as its primary broadcast partner, sports streaming platform DAZN, has begun withholding payments citing a “lack of support” from the league in fighting digital piracy, per a report by Matt Slater in The Athletic.

DAZN began withholding portions of the league’s media rights payments back in February, spurring the need for a mediator to come in and help find a solution. Said mediator suggested that DAZN pay the full media rights fee for this season, plus an additional fee to exit its four-year deal with Ligue 1 early, allowing the league to bring its broadcast inventory back to the open market. Ligue 1 agreed to the proposal, but DAZN rejected the compromise.

Now, the next step is litigation, with Ligue 1 expecting DAZN to fulfill the full terms of the original contract.

It’s the second time in five years that the French league has found itself tied to a media partner looking to bow out of a contract in its first season. During the 2020-21 season, Spanish company MediaPro exited its deal within months of its start, and Amazon Prime and Canal+ filled the void, but paying just half the fee of the original deal.

The crux of the issue is that Ligue 1’s media partners have failed to reach subscriber targets that make the original agreements worthwhile.

The league is facing similar issues in the United States, having recently been forced to re-up a deal with the barely-distributed beIN Sports cable channel after publicly declaring it needed to increase its reach stateside.

The chaos will have significant implications on most Ligue 1 clubs, who might be forced to sell players in order to avoid monetary losses should a media rights solution fail to emerge.