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AFL Finals brings big Thursday win for Seven

AFL on the primary channel drew a big crowd for Seven, albeit more than half were in Melbourne.

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AFL Finals got underway on Seven last night, screening on the primary channel in all states.

It proved to be a winner for the network with 733,000 metro viewers, more than half of whom were in Melbourne given the Collingwood v Melb. match.

The Chase also topped entertainment at 493,000 / 312,000.

Gogglebox scored 420,000 for 10.

Earlier Dogs Behaving (Very) Badly Australia wrapped at 333,000 / 279,000 then 7:30 (279,000), Foreign Correspondent (177,000) and Great Australian Walks with Julia Zemiro (170,000).

Seven network easily won Thursday with 39.4% then Nine 23.1%, 10 17.2%, ABC 12.5% and SBS 7.8%.

Seven News was #1 at 805,000 / 803,000.

Nine News (744,000 / 729,000) was best for Nine. A Current Affair pulled 594,000 then Hot Seat (335,000 / 207,000). In select cities were Emergency (119,000), RBT (116,000), Casualty (99,000). Thursday Night NRLW was 116,000 across the network.

The Project drew 236,000 / 172,000. 10 News First was 220,000 / 146,000. A Cheap Seats replay drew 60,000.

ABC News was 429,000. Extraordinary Escapes (139,000), The Drum (119,000) and Grand Designs NZ (116,000) followed.

On SBS it was SBS World News (137,000 / 108,000), Eva Longoria: Searching For Mexico (71,000), and Mastermind (42,000).

Ben & Holly’s Little Kingdom topped multichannels at 95,000.

The Morning Show: 112,000 / 63,000
Today Extra: 98,000 / 73,000

In Total TV numbers last Thursday were:

Gogglebox: 751,000
Home & Away: 840,000
Great Australian Walks with Julia Zemiro:  345,000
The Front Bar: 513,000
Foreign Correspondent: 470,000

OzTAM Overnights: Thursday 7 September 2023

11 Responses

  1. And for a balanced argument:
    AFL
    98,000 in Adelaide
    75,000 in Brisbane
    59,000 in Perth
    H&A
    44,000 in Adelaide
    75,000 in Brisbane
    61,000 in Perth
    So more in Adelaide, same in Brisbane and a little less in Perth
    So yes while there was less in Sydney, the huge gains in Melbourne make up for it and as Ryan wrote, showcasing finals is probably better in the long run.

  2. Why 7 Sydney shoving the AFL (which involve two VIC Teams) on the main channel is way beyond me? You put this AFL on the main channel & your ratings will suffer. I feel that this is a stupid decision for 7 Sydney to air AFL on the main channel (given that no NSW teams are playing). Tonight’s game Blues-Swans should perform OK on main channel. However, the NRL will continue to dominate in Sydney tonight, even though it is a QLD-VIC rivalry.

    1. Like the NRL, the AFL wants to grow fan numbers in states that traditionally support the other code. They have partnerships with host broadcasters and from time to time I think it makes sense to show bigger matches, such as finals, on the main channel in states where the other code dominates. How else do you grow fan numbers if they can’t be exposed to games on a main channel?

      1. Well, there are two AFL teams based in NSW – Sydney & GWS. Swans do have a higher memberhip number compared to GWS. If you have Swans playing, then Swans games rate higher than GWS in Sydney market. Some people are a bit harsh on ‘Sydney public doesn’t care about AFL’, but Sydney market perform reasonably well, especially when Swans are in Finals. Same for Brisbane. Lions struggled in most of 2010s, but fair to say Brisbane perform reasonably well, when Lions are playing excellent footy.

    2. Channel 7 first in primary channel and network ratings, so it didn’t hurt them too much. 5 city metro doesn’t revolve around Sydney, no matter how much Sydney thinks it should. And I say that as someone who lives in Sydney.

    3. It strikes me as Seven making a calculated decision given the circumstance. It was Finals. NRL was not on (NRLW was on). So Seven saw it as a chance to give some oxygen to the brand. I doubt they would do it weekly, but the timing kinda worked for them to give up a some market win in order to expand the brand as part of long term vision.

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