A “French Premier League”: the FFF president proposes a major overhaul of professional football

Degraded image, drastic reduction in TV rights, uncertainty regarding the broadcasting of Ligue 1 next season, piracy, club deficits estimated between 1.2 and 1.3 billion by the DNCG: professional football is cracking at most points. This is enough to prompt FFF president Philippe Diallo to bring out the heavy artillery to reform the entire system. The FFF president presented this Monday, May 12, in the daily newspaper L'Equipe the details of "a disruptive project" to pull the professional sector out of the financial and governance crisis it is going through. Philippe Diallo proposes in particular to draw inspiration from the model of our English neighbors, with the replacement of the Professional Football League (LFP) by a "club society": "A sort of French Premier League."

"The League, in the form of an association under the 1901 law, would give way to a commercial company in which the clubs would be shareholders," the director explained during a press conference reporting on the work initiated in March as part of the French football general assembly.

This project also provides for a change in governance, with a transition "from a currently elected president" to "a board of recruited professionals who will be appointed by the clubs" , which would amount to moving "from an elective system to a system of appointments" for the management of the future league. The latter would then be "salaried and revocable ad nutum [immediately]" , Philippe Diallo told our colleagues.

The FFF would occupy "a significant position" within this new organization: in this takeover of the League, which operates under a sub-delegation of power, a certain number of powers currently exercised by the LFP would be transferred to the Federation. Among them, the National Directorate of Control and Management (DNCG), the financial watchdog of professional football, and the disciplinary committee, currently controlled by the LFP. This transfer of powers is favored by LFP president Vincent Labrune, whose body, as we know it, would cease to exist.

The company managing French professional football, in addition to media promotion and management, which is still within its scope of action, would also be responsible for "the material organization of the championship," the head of French football further specifies. To carry out his project, Philippe Diallo intends to rely on a bill from senators Michel Savin (LR) and Laurent Lafon (UDI), which is to be examined on June 10. It should then be examined in the National Assembly this fall, for implementation, at best, for the 2026-2027 season.

"We are not in the cosmetic business, but in an innovative project that changes the organization of professional football in France," Philippe Diallo assured our colleagues.