The Winners: Some tabloid angst about Inside The Human Body on Nine. I don’t know why. A quiet news day in the papers perhaps, or someone in Nine publicity though there might be some cheap publicity to be gained? But the program itself was dignified all the way though.

MasterChef had an especially fiendish taste test last night. I thought the blindfold idea should have been used throughout the program, such as blindfolded judges who had to guess who cooked each concoction. It would have been novel TV.

The AFL Footy Show, 307,000 viewers in Melbourne. The NRL Footy Show had 162,000 in Sydney and 100,000 in Brisbane. Higher than last week, because of next week’s third and deciding State of Origin perhaps?

  1. MasterChef Australia (Ten) (7.30pm) — 1.532 million
  2. The Block (Nine) (7pm) — 1.188 million
  3. Seven News (6pm) — 1.166 million
  4. Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.137 million
  5. Nine News (6pm) — 1.135 million
  6. A Current Affair (Nine) (6.30pm) — 1.040 million
  7. Inside The Human Body (Nine) (8.30pm) — 1.035 million

The Losers: Seven, especially No Ordinary Family at 7.30pm: 510,000 viewers — failure. The repeats of How I Met Your Mother would have done better, especially among female viewers.

News & CA: Seven News and Today Tonight lost Sydney and Melbourne to Nine News and ACA. Nine News won Melbourne by a massive 131,000, 415,000 to 284,000. A big loss.

So far this week Sunrise has won each morning.

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.166 million
  2. Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.137 million
  3. Nine News (6pm) — 1.135 million
  4. A Current Affair (Nine) (6.30pm) — 1.040 million
  5. ABC News 7 pm — 873,000
  6. The 7pm Project (Ten) (7pm) — 682,000
  7. 7.30 (ABC) (7.30pm) — 604,000
  8. Ten News (5pm) — 598,000
  9. 6.30 with George Negus (Ten) (6.30pm) — 421,000
  10. 6.30 with George Negus (Ten) (10.30pm) –267,000
  11. Lateline (ABC) (10.25pm) — 222,000
  12. SBS News (6.30pm) — 153,000
  13. Late News/Sports Tonight (Ten) (11pm) — 153,000
  14. Lateline Business (ABC) (11pm) — 109,000
  15. SBS News (9.30pm) — 107,000

In the morning:

  1. Sunrise (Seven) (7am) — 363,000
  2. Today (Nine) (7am) — 329,000

The Stats:

  • FTA: Nine (3 channels) won with a share of 30.8%, from Seven (3) on 25.9%, Ten (3) on 25.4%, the ABC (4) was on 13.7% and SBS (2) ended with 4.2%. Seven leads the week with 31.5% from Nine on 25.8% and Ten with 24.4%.
  • Main Channel: Nine won with a share of 23.7%, from Ten on 19.4%, Seven with 17.4%, ABC 1 on 9.5% and SBS ONE on 3.8%. Seven leads the week with 22.4% from Nine on 19.5% and Ten on 18.0%.
  • Digital: 7TWO won with 4.9% from GO on 4.4%, Eleven on 4.1%, 7mate on 3.6%, ABC 2 on 3.0%, Gem on 2.7%, ONE on 2.0%, ABC 3, 0.7%, News 24, 0.5% and SBS TWO on 0.3%. That’s a FTA viewing share last night of 26.2%. 7TWO leads the week with 5.3%, from 7mate on 3.8%, GO and Eleven on 3.7% each.
  • Pay TV: Nine (3 channels) won with a share of 25.3%, from Seven on 21.3%, Ten was on 20.9%, Pay TV (100 plus channels) was on 14.6%, the ABC (4) ended with 11.3% and SBS (2) ended with 3.4%. The 15 FTA channels had an 85.4% share of TV viewing last night. The 10 digital channels had a total of 21.7%, the five main channels had 63.7% between them. More than 36% of the audience were not watching the main channels last night.
  • Regional: WIN/NBN (3 channels) won with a share of 32.6%, from Prime/7Qld (3) on 27.4%, SC Ten (3) was on 22.0%, the ABC (4) was on 13.2% and SBS (2) ended with 4.8%. WIN/NBN won the main channels with 24.2% from prime/7Qld on 17.9% and SC Ten on 15.9%. GO won the digitals with 4.5%, with 7mate on 5.1% and 7TWO with 4.4%. The 10 digital channels had a total FTA share of 27.6% Prime/7Qld leads the week with 32.5% from WIN/NBN on 28.0%.

Major Markets: Nine’s night, except in Perth, where it again lost overall and the main channels, finishing third behind Seven on top and then Ten. Another weak night for the network from the WIN affiliate with other Nine stations winning. So, Nine won overall in Sydney and Adelaide with Seven second and Ten third. In Brisbane and Melbourne, Ten was second and Seven third. In the main channels it was Nine from Ten and Seven in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide. 7TWO won everywhere but Brisbane where GO won. Seven leads the week everywhere from Nine and Ten except in Perth where Ten is second and Nine a very distant third.

(All shares on the basis of combined overnight 6pm to midnight All People)

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Nine’s night, Seven stuttered for the first time this year on a Thursday evening. Nine and Ten shared the demos, Seven was squeezed out

Thursday nights are tough nights for TV, school, work, sport commitments cut viewing levels, as do people starting the weekend early. For that reason, it’s hard to assemble a big audience in any market, let alone nationally. but last night MasterChef cracked the 2 million mark across the country with 486,000 in regional areas and 1.532 million in the five metro markets. Rolled gold for the sponsors.

The Block could only manage a national figure of 1.652 million, with 462,000 in the regionals and 1.188 million in the metros. That’s solid, but on Thursday nights (unlike Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays) there’s usually only one program attracting a huge national audience, or none at all.

TONIGHT: Tennis and AFL on Seven. NRL on Nine. Taggart again on the ABC needs subtitles and a lot of concentration. Hustle is a bit airy. Seven has movies and other stuff outside AFL states. Nine has minor stuff in non-NRL states. Ten has MasterChef and Burn Notice.

Saturday: Tennis on Seven: the Women’s grand final from Wimbledon. Ten has AFL afternoon and night in various states. Kingdom and New Tricks on the ABC from 7.30pm are both repeats. So nothing fresh. Inspector Morse on 7TWO is old and a repeat and probably the best thing on. Foxtel has NRL and AFL.

Sunday: The morning chats and then NRL and AFL on Seven and Nine and Foxtel. Seven has the Men’s final from Wimbledon late in the evening. That’s after Dancing With The Stars (the end is getting closer) and Downton Abbey which is another great episode.

Nine has In Their Footsteps at 6.30pm, the best program on the network at the moment. Dateline is on SBS at 8.30pm. The ABC has re-arrested Inspector Barnaby on Midsomer Murders (sorry, it’s a repeat) at 8.30pm. Grand Designs is back with fresh episodes at 7.30pm on the ABC. Good choice for viewers overall.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports