The MMA insurer, an emblematic Sarthois company, will terminate in June 2022 to the contract which bound it to the $ 25,000 stadium manager inaugurated in 2011 at the heart of the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
At the end of June 2022, the Manceau football stadium will only be called Mmarena. The MMA Insurance Group, headquartered in the Sartho Capital, decided not to prolong the Naming Contract contracted in 2007 and had taken effect four years later during the inauguration of this 25,000 enclosure. places, becoming the first French football stadium to take the name of a brand.
The Mayor of Le Mans, Stéphane The Foll (PS), revealed the information during the budget guidance debate of his Municipal Council on Thursday, December 9. “MMA wanted to withdraw from the stadium. This was a million euros aid per year,” he emphasized bitterly.
In fact, the insurer had committed this amount annually for a period of ten years. At the time, the Futur Resident Club, the MUC 72 (today Le Mans FC) evolved in Ligue 1 and made its best results. Giving its name to the stadium (built for 104 million euros) was a good advertising placement for MMA.
Compensate for losses
But the clouds quickly accumulated above the fuzzy lawn, clean and figuratively. The football club was only in Ligue 2 when the stadium welcomed its first football fans on January 29, 2011. A year later, the only one and only concert programmed outdoors, that of Johnny Hallyday, was going to be Canceled at the last moment due to diluvian rains. In 2013, it was the Mans FC which was liquidated and downgraded into 6 Division due to enormous financial losses.
Since then, the club has returned patiently the echelons (it currently evolves in national) and gained hope to the territory … and the historical partner who extended his contract until June 2022 to help Le Mans FC find the league 2.
But MMA will not go further. A bad news for the Mans City that pays several million euros per year to the manager (4.1 million in 2021) in order to respect the public-private contract which requires him to offset the losses in case of absence of a club of Ligue 1 in the enclosure.
A bad news also for the Dealer Le Mans Stadium (a subsidiary of the VINCI group) that has already made a lot of effort to reduce its expenses. But his director Yannnick Hoinville remains fair play: “The first thing to do is thank MMA for his eleven years of loyalty in the context we’ve known.” Now the decision is official, he considers “Hands free To start another partner “and uses it now, arguing the benefits of its arena.
“It’s a magnificent infrastructure and one of the best stadiums. Every year, we welcome at least one match from a team from France football and, in the opinion of the French Football Federation, Our stadium is a very envied tool “, advance Yannick Hoinville. It also highlights the dynamism of the resident club to attract the spectators, like the “Christmas game organized on December 14” which will gather at least 16,000 people for the Mans-Cholet meeting. The mmarena stadium will soon lose its name, but it retains a wide audience.