The French football association LFP has said it has awarded the rights to live football coverage from Ligue 1 to Canal+ and Orange for a period of four years starting this summer. The broadcasters will pay a total of €668 million per season between 2008 and 2012. This compares with the €653 million the clubs receive today. Canal+ has won the rights to the two lots covering the rights to all Sunday matches, Orange has acquired the Saturday matches as well as the rights for mobile TV.Canal+ has also the rights to all three “lots fans”, which will allow the broadcaster to offer individual games on a pay-per-view basis on its Kiosque PPV service. Orange has won the VOD rights, but Canal keeps all the rights to various magazine programmes, known as Jour de Foot and Les Spécialistes. The group loses its exclusivity, but keeps all the main assets. It will be interesting to see where Orange will offer its Saturday live games having recently mooted the launch of a DTH platform.
