DAZN has settled the debt owned to the Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP), bringing an uncertain end to a six-month dispute between the sports streaming service and French football body.
The disagreement stems from a five-year deal agreed in August 2024, when DAZN secured Ligue 1 rights for €400 million per year. The streaming company estimated it needed to attract 1.5 million subscribers to make a return on the investment, and the contract included the option for DAZN to terminate the agreement after two seasons if it failed to reach that threshold by December 2025.
By December 2024, DAZN had only attracted 400,000 subscribers to its Ligue 1 package, and sought to renegotiate the agreement. The company refused to make its payment to the LFP in February 2025, and demanded €573 million compensation from the French league. The LFP responded by taking DAZN to the Paris Commercial Court, with a verdict expected last Friday.
But DAZN settled its debt before the deadline, paying the full €35 million it owed the LFP, with the sum to be distributed among the 18 clubs in Ligue 1. The LFP has withdrawn its legal proceedings, but also said in a statement that “discussions are ongoing to resolve all outstanding issues between the LFP and DAZN.”
LFP President Vincent Labrune welcomed the settlement. “I am pleased with DAZN’s decision to pay the €35 million owed to the League and, consequently, to the clubs,” he said. “We have to look forward because we, the clubs, fans and more globally, lovers of French football, have a common interest in DAZN performing well and gaining more followers.”
A game of two halves
While the settlement sidesteps legal action against DAZN, the streaming firm’s grievances remain unresolved. The business accused the LFP of “market dishonesty” and “deception” in its rights sale, for failure to provide the broadcaster’s executives with all the necessary information about Ligue 1’s market distribution before the agreement was signed.
DAZN also accused the LFP of insufficient efforts to combat piracy, thereby limiting uptake for its subscription product. It further claimed the LFP had breached its contract, alleging that certain Ligue 1 clubs had failed to adequately promote the package, or provide the requisite editorial content for the streaming service.
The situtation is exacerbated by financial pressures on both parties. DAZN reported a £1.2 billion loss in 2023, but recently received a further $827 million investment from its owner Sir Leonard Blavatnik, as well as $1 billion from Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF).
Meanwhile the LFP is anxious to avoid a shortfall after selling the Ligue 1 rights for a cut rate last year, securing a last-minute deal with DAZN and Qatari broadcaster beIN. The €500 million sale was half the value the football body had been seeking at the start of the auction, and a sharp drop from the short-lived $814 million deal it struck with Spanish business Mediapro in 2020.
And BeIN also delayed its payments to the LFP, amid ongoing contract disputes between the two parties, resulting in reduced compensation to Ligue 1 clubs. In October 2024, Olympique Lyonnais sent the LFP a formal letter of complaint about the broadcast deal, criticising the reduction in revenue among the teams at a time when commercial TV revenues are also in decline.
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