Triple Market Leader Diversity and Win: Groupe M6 Girondins De Bordeaux Land Three Trophies in France
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4 June 2009 week 23 Triple market leader Diversity and win: Groupe M6 Girondins de Bordeaux land three trophies in France Belgium, Germany Belgium Earth Day programme RTL-TVI on the European elections France Greece L’Expédition RTL in Brazil Steady growth in audiences week 2 COVER: On Sunday 31 May, the players present in Bordeaux to 25,000 supporters their 3 trophies (The French League Cup, the Ligue 1 Championship Trophy and the Champions Trophy) 2 week 23 the RTL Group intranet A stalwart element in diversification Girondins de Bordeaux, the football club owned by Groupe M6 since 1999, this year won the French League Cup, Champions Trophy and the national championship. France - 4 June 2009 At 22:47 on Saturday, 30 May, Girondins de Bordeaux beat rival Caen 1:0 to take France‘s Ligue 1 championship. Bordeaux’s supporters The Strengths of Girondins de and club’s chairman Jean-Louis Triaud had Bordeaux been waiting 10 years for their team to bring home the French top-flight title once again. In The stability of the club’s management: 2006 and 2008, they were runners up, but in “Here, an incoming trainer brings in his 2009 they can bask in the glory of being French assistant, but in the management nothing champions. Moreover, they will qualify directly changes. It’s a question of take it or leave for the Champions League. “This magnificent it!,” explained Jean-Louis Triaud. victory will go down in history,” exclaimed an exultant Alain Juppé, mayor of Bordeaux. The personality of trainer Laurent Blanc, whose contract has been renewed until Throughout the away match played on Caen’s 2011. It may be his first job as coach, but home turf and then late into the night, 80,000 the man was a legendary member of the supporters of the ‘Marine et Blanc’ (thus called French team that won both the World Cup because their traditional team colours are navy in 1998 and the Euro 2000 tournament. blue and white) let their joy burst forth in the That same year, the sports daily L’Equipe Place des Quinconces in Bordeaux where a voted him the fourth greatest French giant screen had been put up for those fans player of the 20th century. unable to make the trip to Normandy. This victory in France’s top division (Ligue 1) – after The qualities of the players, especially an unprecedented eleventh successive winning Yoan Gourcuff and Moroccan centre matches – rounded off a superb season of the forward Marouane Chamakh. beautiful game for the Girondins, who pulled off a treble by winning the championship, the French League Cup and the Champions Trophy. Three cups – a trio for Triaud – made for an unforgettable souvenir photo. On 31 May, with the players back in Bordeaux to present the cup to 25,000 waiting suppor- ters, it was hard to say who was moved most of all. Carried away on a tide of joyous emotion and surrounded by a sea of cheering fans, Laurent Blanc’s players shed tears of unadulte- rated joy. The team’s star player and newly Laurent Blanc, legendary player of the French team 3 and trainer of Bordeaux week 23 the RTL Group intranet A sea of cheering fans welcomes the Laurent Blanc’s players “Happy Shareholder”: Nicolas de Tavernost for a long ovation crowned French Player of the Year, the 22-year- All the Girondins needed to clinch the title was old midfielder Yoan Gourcuff – initially on loan a draw, but in the 49th minute their happy des- from AC Milan – will be staying at Bordeaux, tiny was sealed with a goal by Yoan Gouffran. having signed a contract for another 4 years. That victory ended seven years of supremacy As the club’s chairman, Jean-Louis Triaud, put for rival title challengers Olympique Lyonnais. it, the talented young player “gave precedence Over the last few games, Bordeaux was neck- to the friendship and sporting side of things and-neck with Olympique de Marseille, with rather than purely financial considerations”. both teams alternating at the top of the league And Triaud went on to heap praise on the cool table. This breathtakingly close title race was head kept by trainer Laurent Blanc, to whom he tough on the nerves and kept everyone on ten- claimed the team owed its 11 straight wins, terhooks, but in the end the teams finished 3 saying: “Both in sporting and human terms points apart: 3 points that made a world of dif- something very strong has been created here. ference. Bordeaux will not change its policy and will hang on to its key assets”. Meanwhile, intervie- “A perfect season 10 years in the making” was wed by France 2, Blanc took the opportunity of how Groupe M6 CEO Nicolas de Tavernost gently reminding the chairman that the club described it in an interview given to Le Parisien could definitely do not only with a goalie, but in mid-May, before adding that he was a also with 3 or 4 additional outfield players. “happy shareholder”. He then went on to say: “We are ambitious, but we also have to take 4 week 23 the RTL Group intranet Girondins TV on air since August 2008 On 14 August 2008, the club launched a dedicated TV channel dubbed Girondins TV for its fans, to tell them all about the six- times French league champions. Developed by the club, and directed by Jean-Philippe Doux, Girondins TV broad- casts from the Château du Haillan. M6 Publicité manages the channel’s adverti- sing sales. Jean-Philippe Doux and Marius Trésor provide pre- and post-match commentary for Sunday night’s coverage of the match, which is shown in full after midnight. Mag Yoan Gourcuff, star player of Girondins, has been crowned French 33 and JT 33 introduce the players and Player of the Year and decided to stay in Bordeaux provide commentary on matches played between Tuesday and Friday. account of economic realities”. Last January, speaking to Vincent Parizot on RTL Soir, de The advent of Girondins TV supplements Tavernost reiterated that in fact there was no an already rich and varied media offering inherent clash between playing football and comprising a magazine on sale at news earning money. This ambitious but prudent agents, a website scoring 80,000 hits a management of the club proved to be a suc- month and 3 million pages viewed, plus a cess as it is profitable. In turn, speaking of the mobile phone package and radio broad- club’s shrewd and stable shareholder, Groupe casts. M6, Triaud saluted its management skills, saying: “Our shareholder has always played along(…) We share the cult of reasoned pas- sion(…) We aren’t prepared to risk breaking our plaything”. Football has become an essential programme for television (free to air or pay) in the last 10 years. M6 has been associated with football since 1999 when it became a shareholder in one of the most prestigious French clubs, making it a credible key operator in this market. When Groupe M6 came to the club it brought resources as well as expertise, allowing Bordeaux to reinforce its number one French football club ranking. 5 week 23 the RTL Group intranet Earth day programme On 5 June, N-TV and Club RTL will broadcast Home, a spectacular nature documentary featuring unique, breath-taking bird’s-eye-view images from over 50 countries. The Hot Spring called “Grand Prismatic” Germany - 4 June 2009 In Home, photographer/bestselling author Yann Arthus-Bertrand (Earth From Above) and producer Luc Besson present the awe-inspiring beauty of the Earth while also showing us how vulnerable our planet is. The documentary sets out to build awareness for the urgency of environmental protection, point up the need for action, and convince a worldwide audience of its shared responsibility for the Earth. The broadcast on N-TV at 21:10 is accompa- nied by an ad campaign that will run in three major German dailies on Friday. In Belgium, the French version of Home will be shown by Club The chrysler building in New York RTL – here, the film airs at 20:15. The docu- mentary can also be requested in HD from the video-on-demand platform RTL à l'infini. The impressive masterpiece will make its worldwide debut on television, in cinema thea- tres, on DVD/Blu-ray and on the Internet on 5 June, World Environment Day. The film is a joint project between Yann Arthus-Bertrand, Luc Besson, PPR, as well as Puma and other PPR group brands. Iguazu falls 6 week 23 the RTL Group intranet A marathon of superstars RTL II celebrated it’s 50th edition of the music show The Dome. Germany - 29 May 2009 Performance of the All American Rejects at The Dome On 30 May, RTL II broadcast the 30th edition of In the anniversary show, pop legends A-ha and The Dome. 12 years of pop culture, 22 venues, Pet Shop Boys clearly demonstrated that they 50 shows, 1000 performances, 500,000 fans in are the true fathers of pop, fully deserving of the arenas, and millions upon millions of TV vie- the honorary award they accepted at the event. wers: The Dome is high-level musical perfor- mance at its finest, and RTL II now celebrated The show, complete with numerous surprises, its 50th Dome broadcast. The band Scooter is was broadcast in its entirety on RTL II, from a regular guest, having appeared on the show 16:00 on 30 May – 7.9 per cent of the viewers more than 15 times to date: “The Dome is a aged 14 to 49 tuned in.