There was no match. Vincent Labrune was announced as the winner and it was in an armchair that the president of the LFP was re-elected for four years this Tuesday, with more than 85% of the votes, or 14 votes out of 17 of the board of directors, a vote validated by the general assembly in the afternoon. Cyril Linette, his last-minute challenger, only gathered two votes on his behalf, the 17th consisting of an abstention.
“My first words are for the members of the general assembly who trusted me by more than 85%, a score much higher than that of four years ago, French football has reunited,” declared Labrune after his re-election, in a moderate voice suggesting a modest triumph. “I am pleased with the democratic quality of the debate that I largely encouraged by validating the principle of the drafting of Cyril Linette, who ran a good campaign on a field that was not the same as mine. He favored very general public communication, where for our part we favored the promotion of our project to our voters.”
According to him, Labrune never wavered about the outcome of the vote: “There was a gap between the media perception of this election and reality. The media wanted to make it a presidential election. However, it is not an election by universal suffrage, but more of a shareholders’ meeting.”
“I am obviously disappointed, a little stunned, I expected a better result,” declared Cyril Linette. The former boss of PMU and L’Equipe, who “continues to think that French football needs a “manager” profile at its head, has postponed the question of his resignation from the board of directors, as he had nevertheless committed to doing in the event of defeat. “The governance of French football is satisfied with its strategy and visibly with its results and its management and has demonstrated this very clearly,” he added.
Labrune’s plebiscite cannot indeed hide the mediocre results and the gloomy prospects for French club football. While Labrune had dangled a billion in front of them, they must make do with €500 million per year in TV rights provided by DAZN and BeIN for the period 2024-2029, which is significantly less than the €624 million distributed over the period 2020-2024. As for the billion and a half, raised from the investment fund CVC Capital Partners, it has already been swallowed up. And it will cost 13% of LFP Media’s revenues with no time limit…
“Accelerating the fight against piracy”
Among the presidents, Labrune’s supporters must believe strongly in their horse’s vision to prefer the status quo to any other option. “The League, the families and the clubs have decided that Vincent Labrune remains president,” emphasizes PSG president Nasser Al-Khelaïfi. “He is the best president we have. We will continue to work together to change things.” “Since the beginning, I have said that he is the right man for the job, and he proved it again today,” judges Jean-Pierre Caillot, the president of Reims. “There is what is happening internally and what is relayed externally. We are at the heart of the reactor, we know the work that has been done.” Unless the said presidents have their own rescue plan in mind, and ultimately pay relatively little attention to the man at the controls of the LFP.
For all perspectives, Labrune proposes a rather nebulous “reinvention” of the football product and savings at all levels, starting with himself. “The president of the LFP will have to set an example by making significant gestures with a reduction in remuneration,” he says, his emoluments having recently tripled, going from €400,000 to €1.2 million per year.
“There will be a plan to reduce charges, to increase the distribution base of rights to clubs,” he adds.
As for the relaunch, the L1 college and DAZN executives are scheduled to meet on Wednesday “to see how to accelerate their success and push hard in the fight against piracy”. “Football is pure entertainment, football must not only live during matches but all week long, says the president of the LFP. (…) We must reinvent ourselves, we must reinvent football…” Vincent Labrune will not have too many years to complete his project.