Behind the insolent exploits of PSG, French football dies slowly. It is not just violence in the stadiums, the overflows of the coaches, the battles of ragpickers of club presidents. The fire is also financial. And it has been consuming the system for years. Dazn, the game broadcaster, threatens to no longer pay the Professional Football League (LFP) the millions promised. And fewer and fewer amateurs pay for the championship. The cumulative losses of Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 clubs would reach 1.2 billion euros at the end of the season, according to the estimates of Jean-Marc Mickeler, the president of the DNCG, the club management gendarme. Astronomical. Several clubs urgently seek a buyer, under penalty of bankruptcy. To survive, French football will have to mourn a certain lifestyle. “Clubs must take their responsibilities and accept a few more austere years, while reviewing their model and governance from top to bottom,” executive Marie Barsacq, the Minister of Sports, with L’Express. Who killed French football? There are many suspects and the future uncertain.
Episode 1 – The secret French football wars: Vincent Bolloré’s “Crusade”, Emmanuel Macron’s error
Episode 2 – The crash of French football, between conspiracy and billion flew: “Without PSG, we are Romania”
Chapter 7 – The Arnault family, white knight of tricolor football
On match days, on Saturday afternoon, a scent of glamor floats on the stands of the Charléty stadium, in the south of the capital. A discreet change since the Arnault family took control in November 2024 of Paris FC, a Ligue 2 club, hitherto owned the Pierre Ferracci businessman. We meet Antoine, the eldest son of Bernard, the owner of LVMH, who came with woman and children. Sometimes his two brothers, Frédéric and Antoine are there, accompanied by Xavier Niel, the companion of Delphine, the daughter of the billionaire.
Arnault and football? The luxury group’s wedding with the most popular sport on the planet seems incongruous. With Paris FC, nothing was leaked for months. Officially, it is a purely family adventure. Antoine would have offered him to his brothers and sister with the objective of building together something other than acquisition projects in luxury or wine. Behind the scenes, some people also see the family’s desire to “refrise” French football: 60 % of clubs already belong to foreign owners.
At the end of 2023, Pierre Ferracci decided to give in the club he has been piloting for years. But the boss laid down his conditions. Foreign buyers, why not. But no question of Toper with an investment fund. Two potential buyers toque at the boss’s door: an American and an Italian already owned at the Atalanta Bergame. At the same time, Antoine Arnault, he mandated two bloodhounds from the Rothschild bank in order to offer him files. That of the Bordeaux club arrives on its desk. Why not, it would resonate with the Grand Cru Bordelais Cheval Blanc. Then, it is Reims and the wink possible with the large Champagne houses in LVMH. The Paris FC file rebates cards. Impossible to miss this small club with a navy blue logo on which a stylized Eiffel tower appears. During a Formula 1 Grand Prix, Frédéric Arnault, the CEO of the group’s watches division, whose TAG Heuer brand is one of the nuggets, pushes the file to its partner Red Bull. The Austrian group of energy drinks bites the hook. He is already the owner of two clubs, those of Salzburg and Leipzig, and it has been months since he eyeing the French market.
At the beginning of April 2024, the Arnault imposed two conditions at Ferracci: being in the majority and going on the adventure with Red Bull. Banco, the case was definitively signed at the end of November 2024. Agache Sport, the subsidiary of the Personal Holding of the Arnault, took 52.4 % of the club, the Austrian group almost 11 %. According to our information, the club is valued nearly 50 million euros. The Arnaults would therefore have spent nearly 25 million euros to set foot in French football. With the aim of climbing 85 % of the club’s capital within three years.
Their ambition? “Go up in Ligue 1, stay there and climb walking after walking,” sums up a close to the family. Michel Denisot, the former president of PSG, arrived at the board of directors of Paris FC. And from next season, the players’ crampons will plow the lawn of the Jean-Bouin stadium, just in front of the Parc des Princes. The taste of a future confrontation between the two Parisian clubs? All the major European cities, London, Milan, Madrid or Barcelona, are home to several clubs. It remains to be seen whether the arrival of the Arnault will serve as a model for other French shareholders with deep pockets. Laurent Lairy, the president of Laval, dreams of seeing the Besnier family, owner of Lactalis, going up to the capital. Some people push the Saadé to invest more at Olympique de Marseille. Chance or not, François Pinault, the founder of Kering, has massively reinvested in recent months in the Rennes club of which he owns. Another way to relaunch the battle between the two tycoons of hexagonal luxury.
Chapter 8 – And now …
A subscription to French football for any purchase of a Big Mac. Dazn’s latest offer, in partnership with McDonald’s, is spectacular. Since March 17, for ordering a Golden menu on the Internet, a pass to follow Ligue 1 until the end of the season is offered. The diffuser is lacking in return, his balance is 1.5 million subscribers, he has three times less.
The dialogue with the LFP has hardened, several legal proceedings were launched, in particular for “deception on the goods”. The platform points hacking, legislation exceeded. A bill for senators Michel Savin and Laurent Lafon aims to delegate the power to block the unlawful broadcasting channels of matches soon. An exit clause exists in the contract between Dazn and the LFP, at the end of the 2025-2026 season. Its activation is a serious hypothesis.
Clubs have never been so at the discs. Bein has never paid the 20 million euros in sponsorship, in front of the refusals of certain clubs to display Qatar in their stadium. In Angers, President Saïd Chabane paid 60 % of wages in January. In Nantes, Waldemar Kita announces in private that he will have to release 45 million euros from her pocket at the end of the season. In Montpellier, Laurent Nicollin had a public call for buyers.
Who to save them? CVC could return to the pot, but financiers demand to choose the name of the director general of LFP Media first. Amélie Oudéa-Castera has been approached, but conflicts of interest with her previous minister function prevent him from applying. Stéphane Richard, the former managing director of Orange, would have given his agreement … only if he does not evolve under the direction of Vincent Labrune. In the absence of consensus, the financiers would have turned to another profile, a media and sports professional.
In front of the thin cows announced, two strategies oppose. There is the Labrune plan. He dreams that Ligue 1 attracts more billionaires like the Arnault family. The injected liquidity will make it possible to obtain results on the continent and even to compete with the PSG, therefore to restart the suspense. Faced with this project focused on “locomotives”, a small music is heard, carried by “old -fashioned” presidents. That of greater equity, in English, where the distribution of TV rights is done according to a scale of 1 to 3 between the first and the last, against 1 to 9 in France.
“I am one of the last of the Mohicans. Many of us dropped the case. I spokes myself the spokesperson for healthy football, which does not forget the genesis of clubs, which is to give a good image of our territory,” said Laurent Lairy, the president of Laval. In Strasbourg, supporters have been pursuing an applause strike since the start of the season until the 15th minute, to protest the takeover by Blueco, an American investment fund. On the field, the Alsatian team is seventh, four points from the Champions League. One of his best seasons for forty years. The paradoxes of modern football.
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