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September TV loves sport

Two AFL matches roared to over 1.4m giving Seven and TEN some big victories, but it was GO! that again helped Nine across the line to win Week 38.

gfcSport is surging in September. Two AFL matches roared to over 1.4m giving Seven and TEN some big victories, notably helping the latter save face after an ordinary week. NRL topped 1m at Nine and also helped the network win Sunday. But while audiences fluctuate it was GO! that again got Nine across the line to win Week 38 -the second such glory in a row.

Nine finished with 28.9% ahead of Seven’s 27.5% and TEN’s 20.7%. The ABC had 17.7% and SBS 5.2%.

Nine won all key demos 16-39, 18-49 and 25-54.

GO! finished on 2.2%, ABC2 had 1.6%, ONE had 1.2% and SBS TWO 0.4%.

Nine  took out Sunday, Monday, Thursday. Seven won Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday. TEN took Saturday. While Seven snared Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth, Nine won Sydney and Brisbane (the latter by a huge margin).

Nine News (Sunday) was the strongest for Nine, with 1.56m defeating Seven News. Its big Sydney win was helped by the NRL lead in. Its other performers included The Farmer Wants a Wife, Domestic Blitz, 60 Minutes, Two and a Half Men, 20 to 1. The finale for Farmer was a strong 1.42m -but the series itself was lower than previous seasons leaving Nine with some tough decisions. Rescue: Special Ops still sits at 1.01m, but takes second in its slot. RPA and The Gift have held well for Nine on Wednesdays. The AFL Footy Show continues to upstage its NRL equivalent. Today had one win over Sunrise on Tuesday, no doubt aided by the US Open. The Big Bang Theory was GO’s best on 262,000 and the channel again helped Nine across the finish line for the second week in a row. On Sunday night GO! even beat SBS.

Packed to the Rafters saw a slight drop this week, to 1.8m viewers, but enough to maintain its stranglehold on the #1 position. Also strong were Border Security, The Force, Seven News, Today Tonight, RSPCA Animal Rescue, Last Chance Surgery, World’s Strictest Parents and Sunday Night. Of its returning shows Border was the top drawcard on 1.54 while Last Chance Surgery‘s premiere on 1.4m held most of its RSPCA lead in. An AFL match roared to 1.45m on Friday. Less successful was Thursday night where Gary Unmarried managed a lowly 800,000 -a poor Total People figure given the slot. In a late slot Double Take is trickling down to 433,000. The Wednesday shift for City Homicide was comparable to Monday 1.17m -but why is the series no longer tracking as it well as it has traditionally? All Saints was dropped after 11 years on those raw figures, in a later slot. With its shifting nights and cast changes it would appear loyal fans are keeping the faith, but not the broader audience. Deal or No Deal and Sunrise both beat their competition on Nine. Saturday’s dreadful 16.0% share probably lost the network the week. It was fourth for the night behind the ABC.

AFL aside it wasn’t a good week at TEN. Saturday’s match soared to 1.44m whil Rush was next with on 1.05m. All its other regular hitters slipped under the magic 1m mark: Australian Idol, Good News Week, NCIS, Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?, Rove. Idol‘s performance was so poor the network has returned it to its traditional 7:30pm start. What will it do if it doesn’t improve? Glee‘s 871,000 is a non-issue given it was a repeat. The real test is this week. The network has invested a lot in the show by bringing the cast to Australia. It should pay off in the demos. The disappointing 396,000 who turned out for Nurse Jackie belies the show’s quality. It moves to Mondays from next week. The Spearman Experiment took a big fall to 699,000 now that viewers have cottoned on to its shortcut format. FIA Formula One took 146,000 on ONE. Saturday’s 31.8% share was a huge victory for TEN and the network is set up nicely for its AFL Grand Final broadcast.

Midsomer Murders snatched back the weekly win at the ABC with 1.36m over Spicks and Specks 1.21m. Meanwhile Stephen Fry in America, ABC News, Skippy: Australia’s Firt Superstar, Australian Story, The New Inventors, George Gently all did good business. The last ever Cook and the Chef bowed out on 757,000 (up from 604,000 the preceding week). Star Stories took 712,000, significantly less than The Librarians. The show is effectively filling a slot before Hungry Beast is unleashed next week. The death of Patrick Swayze didn’t push The Beast into the Top 100 shows for Tuesday. The Wire bettered it. Junkyard Wars is still ABC2’s most popular offering. The ABC beat TEN on Friday and Seven on Saturday. Australia loves weekends with the ABC.

SBS’ Top Gear 944,000 was third in its slot with Costa’s Garden Odyssey its next best at 301,000.

Week 38

23 Responses

  1. @Craig, you misunderstand my point. Ten launched a new SD channel, which was cool, but they then changed their HD channel to rebroadcast the same thing.

    In order to view either the second SD channel or the HD channel, you need a set-top box. By buying a set-top box, you get two more Ten channels, but it’s really only one. This is why I think it’s a silly idea.

    The only reason I can think of is that there are some people out there without a HD TV so the SD channel is there for them, but in my opinion that’s a lame reason. I would imagine that if you viewed the HD channel on a non-HD TV it would just be in SD anyway.

  2. Let’s face it David the system they are using currently is ordinary,including all channels etc eg Go under one roof.As we all know having Prime Time shares counted only,we all know why that is because that’s when most people are at home watching TV.I don’t see a problem with time-shifting at all but it should not be including in the overall scheme of things.As previously mentioned i’m not a fan of any particular network,but i’m sure this will be sorted sometime down the track.Well done to Channel 7 for the weekly win lol……….Go Cats!

  3. This weeks was great to the sporting fans. There’s too much great sporting games – the finals series of the AFL and NRL (it’s a shame the dragons are out. lol), the US Open Finals (tennis) and the rugby union (which no-one watched).

    I know that Ten’s AFL Grand Final will rate big, but it’s a shame that it won’t count into the nightly or weekly % shares. If the news is at 6 and sports tonight at 6.30 (sorry, i don’t know when they are on for that night), then it’s shares will be a littler better.

  4. I believe that for each channel ratings should be reported seperately and classed as a “channel rating” and then have seperate figures with them added for “network ratings” which will help clear the line between the two.
    Channel Seven (just the channel, not the network) could win a week, but the Nine Network could also win as well as Seven.

  5. David, couldnt agree more. No one cared when OneHD started adding to 10’s share. Ten easily won the night that OneHD was lauched and no one complained, now that GO has helped Nine win weeks, every1 is complaining. Im no Nine fan, but they deserve to be rewarded for an awsome MultiChannel. This is good for us, as it will force Seven to get there channel up and running sooner. The fact that the Number1 TV station in this country for the past 3 years has been last in doing a multichannel. They should of been leading the way and deserve to to be winning weeks for letting us, the viewer down. As David pointed out, the 3 networks own OzTam and all agreed that the multi channels will be included into the Network share. All you 7 fan boys build a bridge and instead of complaining that 7 are losing weeks, complain they dont have a second channel on the air.

  6. It’s amazing how people didn’t complain about ABC2 shares being added with ABC1, or ONE with TEN until Nine started having wins with GO!

    This has been going on for ages…and Seven knew they could have an extra channel from January 1.

    While we’re at it, why don’t we get up in arms about the fact that it’s ‘only’ primetime shares that decide the week’s result? In 3 months there will be time-shifting added. The ratings system is changing with technology. At the end of the day, regardless of how “fair” it is or isn’t, all networks are on the same level playing field. Seven, Nine and TEN own OzTAM -if there’s a problem with the system I’m sure they would be the first to address it.

  7. @Mitch because it’s called ONE HD the whole point is a 24/7 HD Sports channel that you don’t have to pay for!

    @DanR – because Nine owns GO!, TEN owns ONE, ABC owns ABC2 and SBS Owns SBS2 if they were run by other companies then they would not be lumped together in the ratings, Seven know this but has chosen to wait a full year are being about to do a 2nd SD channel and chose not to, their loss!

  8. Seven must be feeling stupid in having not already launched a second SD channel by now. Their continual delay is tarnishing the network’s image – with Nine cementing its audience in the highly successful GO! channel. Despite all the promises of Seven’s multichannelling, their single channel will continue to lose audience – Deal or No Deal and Sunrise are looking stale, so are the ever-diminishing 7HD breakaways.

  9. Yep DanR, me neither. The real figures for the week were:
    ABC1 – 15.6%
    ABC2 – 1.6%
    Seven – 27.5%
    Nine -26.7%
    GO! – 2.2%
    Ten – 19.5%
    ONE – 1.2%
    SBS One – 4.8%
    SBS Two – 0.4%

  10. 9, 10 and 7 should really show their sport on the main tv, and their regular programming including news etc on their digital only channels – force people to upgrade to digital

  11. I don’t get why the digital channels are lumped in with the main channels to decide who wins the week overall …. fair enough if they’re broadcasting the same content but as they’re not what’s the rationale?

  12. I don’t know why Ten don’t just make ONE their second SD channel and return their HD channel to a HD broadcast of their main channel. I reckon they could boost their shares up a bit. People like to watch their shows in HD – I know I do.

    I mean, you have to buy a set-top box for both the second channel and the HD one anyway (correct me if I’m wrong? =S) so it seems pointless to have them both the same…

  13. Sucked in to the Rugby Union. 289,000 viewers nationwide and beaten by Bewitched (293,000). If only the games lived up to the musical montages and adverts. Hurry up and die already, Kick & Clap code.

  14. Today’s win on Tuesday was not helped by the US Open. If you look at the breakdowns, Early Today beat Early Sunrise from 6-7am too, not just the last hour or 7-9am. Additionally, the US Open only received 17K more than The Morning Show, hardly enough to produce a win – Today was up more than 50K on their normal average and beat Sunrise by 10K.

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