The Ligue de Football Professionnel, the French football league, has launched a tender for the media rights for Ligue 2, the country’s second-tier football league, for four seasons, from 2012-13 to 2015-16.
The tender covers the live rights for all 10 Ligue 2 fixtures per week. The league said on Friday that it had contacted the “main market players” about the tender.
Earlier this month French pay-television broadcaster Ma Chaîne Sport failed in an attempt to block the launch of the tender at the Tribunal de Grande Instance, the tribunal of first instance in Paris.
The broadcaster has an ongoing, separate claim against the league in the Tribunal de Commerce business court regarding a 2010 tender for Ligue 2 rights for a cycle beginning in 2011-12. The league turned down an offer from Ma Chaîne Sport for the rights and instead launched its own digital-terrestrial pay-television channel, CFoot, to show the matches. Cfoot failed to attract enough subscribers and will close at the end of the 2011-12 season.