The governing body of French top-flight football has launched a legal action against DAZN after it threatened not to pay an outstanding €35 million on its Ligue 1 TV rights contract.
The figure represents half of the money owed to clubs under the contract, according the French sports daily L’Equipe.
“The LFP intends to firmly defend the interests of French professional clubs, while hoping for an amicable solution to this dispute, which it hopes will be temporary,” the LFP said in a statement.
DAZN claims it is operating under difficult conditions, in part due to piracy, and what it sees a a lack of co-operation from some clubs in the promotion of the Ligue 1 competition.
“It is not this procedure that will solve the problems to make the product attractive,” Brice Daumin, director of DAZN France, told AFP, claiming that the LFP had not responded to earlier request to discuss the matter.
It is estimated that DAZN has around 500,000 subscribers in France, short of the 1.5 million that had been hoped for at the start of the season.
In a deal agreed last July, LFP will receive an annual €500,000 for the contract, considerably less than it had been hoping for within the new 2024-2029 cycle.
The arrangement – which includes a get-out clause for DAZN after two years – followed weeks of uncertainty as to whether the Ligue would actually have a broadcaster with the Ligue considering setting up its own channel.
