(Reuters) A TF1 spokeswoman stated that Etienne Mougeotte, vice-chairman at TF1, had outlined TF1's plans for the tournament in comments to a private meeting with the channel's advertisers early this week.
He said TF1 would charge EUR222,000 ($196,070) for a 30-second spot at half-time during the final, if the French national team was playing.
However if the French team was not playing, a 30-second spot would cost EUR100,000 ($88,320), the spokeswoman said.
During the final of the 1998 World Cup, when France beat Brazil three-nil at home, TF1 garnered FF52 million in advertising receipts - it sold its most expensive 30-second spot for FF1.5 million ($250,000) at the time. It tallied 17.7 million viewers or 67.5 percent of those watching TV in France that evening.
TF1 said late in November that it agreed to pay Germany's KirchMedia EUR168 million ($148.4m) for exclusive French rights to broadccast the 2002 World Cup, running from May 31 to June 30, plus 24 matches from the 2006 tournament.
Analysts estimated that TF1 was paying roughly EUR100 million ($88.3m) for the 2006 tournament, to take place in Germany. The rest would go on the 2002 event, taking place in Japan and Korea.
They said the deal would push up TF1's programming costs sharply for 2002, but the channel would find it hard to balance this with revenue, given the current advertising downturn and the unfavourable time zone for live match audiences.
French commercial TV channel TF1 , which has bought exclusive French rights to the 2002 World Cup soccer tournament, said it is seeking four parties to each pay EUR2.3 million ($2.03m) to sponsor live match coverage.
