LFP elections: Cyril Linette finally authorized to run for president against Vincent Labrune

Cyril Linette pourra bien se présenter à l'élection de la LFP. MAXPPP – Vincent Isore

Rejected three days ago, the former sports director of Canal + finally obtained on Monday the second sponsorship needed to run for the presidency of the Professional Football League (LFP) against the incumbent Vincent Labrune, on September 10.

Cyril Linette, rejected three days ago, finally obtained on Monday the second sponsorship needed to run for the presidency of the Professional Football League (LFP) against the incumbent Vincent Labrune, on September 10, we learned from the president of the UAF Alain Belsoeur. The candidates had to collect two sponsorships: that of Foot Unis, the union of professional clubs, and of the UAF (Union of Football Actors), bringing together the different “families” (players' unions, coaches, doctors, referees, administrative staff).

Or Cyril Linette, former sports director of Canal+ and former CEO of L'Equipe and PMU, had been sponsored by Foot Unis but had not received the support of the UAF on Friday, leaving Vincent Labrune alone in the running for the election. Faced with the outcry caused by this decision, and in particular the intervention of the Minister of Sports Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, according to several sources close to the case, the UAF decided to review its copy and grant an additional sponsorship to Cyril Linette.

Labrune, Olive and Guerrini, the other candidates

This one is in addition to the three personalities already endorsed on Friday: Vincent Labrune, Karl Olive, Renaissance MP for Yvelines, and Alain Guerrini, boss of Panini. The latter did not receive the endorsement of Foot Unis. “We drew our attention to democracy and it is a value that is important to us. So, we sponsored a fourth candidate. The conditions that we had set (to draft Cyril Linette, editor's note) were also fully accepted, that is to say that the statutes of the League are duly modified after the elections so that the UAF has in the future an independent position on the Board of Directors”, indicated the president of the UAF Alain Belsoeur to the AFP.

It is therefore a Labrune-Linette duel that is looming to compete for the head of the LFP during the General Assembly scheduled for September 10. Karl Olive, who will sit on the CA within the college of “independents” as a representative of the French Football Federation, did not announce his intention to run for election as president.

Linette thanked the presidents

“I thank the presidents and football families for the trust they have shown in me, by allowing me to run for election as president of the LFP”, reacted Cyril Linette on X, explaining that he had to “commit (…) not to remain on the board of directors” in case of defeat. “The election will give us the opportunity to debate the necessary developments in governance for better representation of stakeholders. I will now do everything to win this election in order to put in place, with the entire professional world, a method and a project that will allow us to face the crisis, then to invent a new prosperous and sustainable model for all the players and lovers of French football”, he added.

Elected president of the League in 2020, Vincent Labrune has been heavily criticized since the upheavals of the allocation of Ligue 1 TV rights to DAZN and beIN Sports for 500 million euros per year, after the failure of the call for tenders launched last year and the aborted promise to reach one billion euros. To get French football out of the rut after the Covid-19 outbreak, Labrune also struck a highly controversial deal with CVC, a Luxembourg investment fund, which brought in €1.5 billion in exchange for around 13% of its lifetime commercial revenue.