The Winners: Just 8 programs with a million or more viewers. Seven again won quite easily on a Sunday night for a second week in a row. Seven’s The Force at 8 pm averaged 1.599 million people, with Border Security second at 7.30 pm with 1.514 million. Bones at 8.30 pm averaged 1.363 million and won for Seven, as did the 6 pm News with 1.313 million and Sunday Night at 6.30 pm with 1.202 million. Nine News was 6th with 1.090 million, 60 Minutes was next with 1.027 million and 20 to 1 at 6.30 pm on Nine averaged 1.004 million in 8th. The ABC’s escapist My House in Umbria averaged 947,000 at 8.30 pm, Seven’s Castle won 9.30 pm with 947,000. Nine’s movie, No Reservations averaged 821,000 from 8.30 pm.

The Losers: Losers? Idol, 890,000 for two hours from 7.30 pm is not good enough. Rove, 678,000 at 9.30 pm crippled by Idol. Electric Dreams Ten, 6.30 pm, 513,000. Poor, crippled an already weakened Idol. Ten’s News At Five had a bigger audience from 5 pm to 6.30 pm with 726,000 than Rove or Electric Dreams. Ten is confident it will get a 30% share of TV ad revenues in 2010, no it won’t if this is repeated next year when Idol is on. Ten needs Idol, or it needs to spend a lot more money on a new format next year if Idol is junked. Rove finishes up next week for the year and in its current form. They will all be glad to get away from the dead hand of Idol as a lead-in.

News & CA: Seven News again won nationally and in every market but Melbourne and Adelaide. The 7pm ABC news with 275,000 viewers, finished ahead of Nine in Sydney with 264,000. The about to retire Ian Ross-hosted Seven News averaged 327,000 in Sydney. Ten News At Five averaged 726,000. World News Australia on SBS at 6.30 pm averaged 172,000. The 7 pm ABC News had a national audience of 863,000. In the morning Seven’s Weekend Sunrise averaged 363,000, Landline at Noon on the ABC, 292,000. Today on Sunday on Nine, 242,000 from 8 am, Insiders on the ABC from 9 am, 238,000. Inside Business at 10 am, 141,000, Offsiders at 10.30 pm, 133,000. Meet The Press on Ten at 8 am, 42,000.

The Stats: Seven won last night with a 6 pm to midnight All People combined share of 32.2% (31.8%) from Nine with 26.8% (26.4%), Ten with 18.3% (17.9%), the ABC with 17.4% (14.8%). Seven won all five metro markets. Digitally Nine’s GO won with a share of 4.10% (Nine’s main channel was on 22.80%), from 7TWO with 2.50% (Seven’s main channel was on 29.80%). Ten’s ONE averaged 1.30% (17.000 for Ten’s Main channel). ABC 2 was on 0.50% (ABC 1, 16.90%) and SBS TWO with 0.20% (SBS ONE, 5.10%). In regional areas a win for Prime/7Qld with 31.5% from WIN/NBN with 24.3%, the ABC with 19.0%, Southern Cross (Ten) with 18.7%, SBS was on 6.5%.

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Seven won last week by a fairly convincing margin. The Melbourne Cup and the wedding on Packed To The Rafters did much of the work, along with an unusually strong Sunday night. The five FTA digital channels averaged 7.3% last week. Fusion Strategy pointed out that in the wide 16 to 54 demographic group ( the widest viewing group), Pay TV’s prime time share fell by 10% for another week last week. The share was off 45,000. The influence of Nine’s Go, 7TWO, Ten’s ONE and ABC 2 is starting to grow and make inroads into Pay’s audience.

The past two Sundays have seen 7TWO broadcasting and the network has had two of its best Sunday nights so far this year. This will give the embattled and ‘broke’ FTA sector heart and make Foxtel even more determined to see some significant changes in the sports anti-siphoning rules. Sport remains the biggest audience puller on Pay TV. The 5th One Day International between India and Australia on FOX Sports last week had the highest audience of the week on Pay TV of 232,000 people. NZ’s Next Top Model averaged 113,000 for its first ep of the new series. Midsomer Murders averaged 128,000. On ABC 1 on Friday night, Midsomer Murders (an old ep that was on Nine), averaged 1.428 million people.

Last night saw Seven again win convincingly in the primary channel battle and in All People, 16 to 39s, 18 to 49s and 25 to 54s. All up the five digital channels averaged 8.6%, down from 8.80% a week ago. Pay TV’s audience rose last night because of the One Day Cricket match won by Australia over India. It had started much earlier than before and ran into early prime time.

Sunday Night maintained its lead over Nine’s 60 Minutes in the Sunday evening current affairs stakes. Ten was again poor last night. The ABC ran second from 8.30 pm to 10.15 pm behind Seven and in front of Nine. Slotting a movie into Sunday nights at 8.30 pm (except for isolated successes) is generally a mark of programming failure. No product, and no idea. At the moment the networks are programming much of Friday and Saturday nights in that fashion. Nine is showing movies at 8.30 pm Sundays because it has nothing left in the vault that it can put in there. Nine has two movies from 8.30 pm next Sunday.

TONITE: Top Gear on SBS (it’s one of those travelogue programs which are usually best avoided!). The Mentalist on Nine at 8.30 pm. Good News Week, Ten, 8.30 pm. Australian Story on the ABC at 8 pm. Criminal Minds at 9.30 pm on Seven.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports.