The Team would like to recover the channel number of C8 or NRJ 12

Who will take the place of C8 and NRJ12, the two channels removed from DTT frequencies in 2025? The L'Équipe channel would be happy to take over number 8 or number 12, left vacant. The group wrote to Arcom (formerly CSA), the French audiovisual watchdog, to declare its candidacy, as revealed by The Parisian . The television channel of the famous sports daily currently occupies channel 21 of TNT.

Broadcaster of the biathlon and alpine skiing World Cups, the Italian football championship, matches of the French Espoirs football team and even pétanque, the L'Équipe channel would like to get closer to the news channels – France Info, LCI, CNews, BFMTV – grouped around channel number 15. It highlights its main specificity: being the only free sports channel in the French audiovisual landscape.

The appeals of C8 and NRJ 12 rejected

However, the eviction of C8 and NRJ12 is not yet fully validated. For the reallocation of 15 DTT frequencies in 2025, Arcom had in fact unveiled a preselection at the end of July. This excluded the two current licensees, C8 and NRJ12, whose lease expires at the end of February, as well as several new candidates including the radical left web television Le Média. The three channels challenged this preselection before the Council of State. This Friday, the highest administrative court ruled “inadmissible” the appeal of the two channels against the loss of their frequency, because it was filed too early. For the Council of State, the “shortlist” not worth “neither attribution for the candidates who appear there, nor definitive rejection for the others”and therefore cannot be attacked.

To file another appeal, C8 and NRJ 12 will have to wait for the final list that Arcom will publish after the conclusion of agreements with the new frequency holders. “Only the final decisions of Arcom, which should take place in December, will definitively establish the candidates selected for TNT, and these can be contested before the Council of State, including urgently”argued the body. In the Arcom preselection, two newcomers were preferred to C8 and NRJ12: OFTV (Ouest-France group) and RéelsTV (CMI France, from Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky).