Wild Boys and Underbelly continue to shed viewers

Seven will be taking a long hard look at the ratings for Wild Boys and starting to wonder about 2012. It lost 122,000 viewers from last week to be down 562,000 on its opening.

The Winners: Nine won, Seven was second, Ten did a bit better because the return of Junior MasterChef did a lot better than The Renovators.

Ten will be a bit unhappy with the NCIS two hours last night. The 8.30 episode averaged 692,000, which was third behind the repeated Bones on Seven and Underbelly: Razor on Nine. The 9.30 episode averaged 514,000, which beat the repeated Castle on Seven narrowly (500,000), but was a distant second to Person of Interest, which debuted at 9.30 on Nine (791,000).

Underbelly: Razor (Nine) (8.30pm) — 1.397 million
Seven News (6pm) — 1.319 million
Sunday Night (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.304 million
Nine News (6pm) — 1.154 million
Junior MasterChef (Ten) (7.30pm) — 1.129 million
60 Minutes (Nine) (7.30pm) — 1.113 million
Wild Boys (Seven) (7.30pm) — 1.103 million

The Losers: Hard to see any real losers. The Renovators at 6.30pm, 692,000 — so the Ten audience almost doubled at 7.30pm for Junior MasterChef, which is an indictment of how viewers regard The Renovators in comparison. .

News & CA: No football, so a clear win to Seven News nationally, but not in Sydney (where Nine was again an easy winner) nor in Melbourne (where Nine News got up as well). Seven had big wins in Brisbane, Adelaide and especially Perth.

Seven News (6pm) — 1.319 million
Sunday Night (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.304 million
Nine News (6pm) — 1.154 million
60 Minutes (Nine) (7.30pm) — 1.113 million
ABC News (7pm) — 741,000
Nine News (5pm) – 400,000
Ten Evening News (Ten) (6pm) — 385,000
Ten News (5pm) — 354,000
SBS News (6.30pm) — 162,000
Dateline (SBS) (8.30pm) — 141,000
The Bolt Report (Ten) (4.30pm) (repeat) — 126,000

In the morning:

Weekend Sunrise (Seven) (8am) — 319,000
Weekend Today (Nine) (8am) — 299,000
Insiders (ABC) (9am) — 201,000 (+ 33,000 on News 24 simulcast)
Landline (ABC) (Noon) — 163,000
Inside Business (ABC) (10pm) — 128,000
Offsiders (ABC) (10.30am) — 122,000
The Bolt Report (Ten) (10am) — 119,000
Meet The Press (Ten) (10.30am) — 88,000

The Stats:

FTA: Nine (3 channels) won with a share of 29.7%, from Seven (3) on 27.0%, Ten (3) was on 23.2%, the ABC (4) was on 15.9% and SBS (2) was on 4.2%.
Main Channel: Nine won with 22.9%, from Seven on 20.8%, Ten was on 15.1%, ABC 1 was on 13.1% and SBS ONE ended with 3.8%.
Digital: ONE won with a share of 5.1%, from Gem in 3.5%, 7TWO and GO were on 3.3% each, Eleven was on 3.0%, as was 7mate. ABC 2 was on 1.9%, ABC 3 was on 0.5% and News 24 and SBS TWO were on 0.4% each. The 10 digital channels had an FTA share in prime time last night of 24.4%.
Regional: Prime/7Qld (3 channels) won with a share of 30.7%, from WIN/NBN (3) on 29.0%, SC Ten (3) was on 19.9%, the ABC (4) was on 16.2% and SBS (2) ended on 4.2%. Prime/7Qld won the main channels with 22.8% from WIN/NBN on 20.2%, SC Ten on 13.2% and ABC 1, 13.1%. Gem won the digitals with 4.3%, from GO and 7TWO on 4.3% and ONE on 4.1%. Junior MasterChef didn’t click with regional viewers, averaging 350,000 viewers and was the 8th most watched program. That ABC 1 almost beat SC Ten in the main channels tells us how regional viewers avoided the program. It still was Ten’s most watched program last night. The top five programs in regional areas last night were 1. Wild Boys — 564,000; 2. Sunday Night — 491,000; 3. Underbelly: Razor — 485,000; 4. Nine News — 433,000; 5. Seven News — 431,000.

Pay TV: Nine (3 channels) won with a share of 24.8%, from Seven (3) on 22.5%, with Ten (3) on 19.3%, pay TV (200-plus channels) was on 14.0%. the ABC (4) was on 13.2% and SBS (2) ended on 3.5%. The 15 FTA channels had an 86.0% viewing share last night. The 10 digital channels had a share of 19.5%, while. the five main channels had a share of 66.5%.

The top five pay TV channels last night were:

Fox Sports 3 (3.26%)
Fox 8 (2.78%)
TVI (2.2%)
Lifestyle (2.05%)
Comedy Channel (1.79%)

The top five pay TV programs were:

RWC: Argentina v Scotland (Fox Sports 3) — 141,000
RWC: Ireland v Russia (Fox Sports 3) — 100,000
RWC: Fiji v Samoa (Fox Sports 3) — 99,000
The Simpsons (Fox 8) — 91,000
RWC: RWC Centre (Fox Sports 3) — 87,000

Major Markets: Nine had a very strong win in Sydney, both overall and in the main channels. Nine also won Adelaide overall and the main channels. But in Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth it was Seven from Nine and Ten, overall and in the main channels. One had a clean sweep with the F-1 race from Singapore.

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

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Last week, was Seven’s week nationally overall, the main channels and in the digital channels. Nine won Sydney, Seven won Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. Seven and Nine tied Brisbane overall (but Nine won the main channels, so a sort of win there). Prime/7Qld won the regionals overall and the digitals, but the NRL finals lifted WIN/NBN to a winning position in the main channels for the week.

An interesting night last night, Nine won, but Seven will be taking a long hard look at the ratings for Wild Boys and starting to wonder about 2012. It lost 122,000 viewers from last week to be down 562,000 on its opening. That’s a 30% loss, which is just a bit high.

Underbelly: Razor‘s loss grew by a mere 9000, and extended its loss to more than 50%. But it launched on the night The Block ended, which boosted its debut figures, and that has accentuated the size of the fall.

Junior MasterChef gave Ten its first million-viewer program for some weeks.

Most watched nationally last night:

Underbelly — 1.926 million
Sunday Night — 1.863 million
Seven News — 1.844 million
Wild Boys — 1.736 million
Nine News — 1.603 million

The weekend football finals had a grim message for the AFL: it’s not as popular as the NRL. Yes, the AFL’s Collingwood-Hawthorn thriller on Friday night was the most-watched program in metro markets, but not when regional figures were included.

According to Fusion Strategy in Sydney, the NRL audiences for the season so far are up 15% or more, while the AFL audience is up 2.2%. Fusion’s Steven Allen says the NRL has more than regained last year’s losses, the AFL hasn’t, so far.

Let’s look at the rankings for the weekend finals.

The most watched finals were:

NRL: Melbourne v Auckland (Saturday night) (Nine) — 1.836 million viewers (1.174 million in metro markets).
NRL: Manly v Brisbane (Friday night) (Nine) — 1.680 million viewers (1.023 million in metro markets).
AFL: Collingwood v Hawthorn (Friday night) (Seven) — 1.671 million (1.318 million in metro markets).
AFL: Geelong v West Coast — (Saturday) (Ten) — 1.378 million (1.095 million in metro markets).

The AFL is spending millions of dollars expanding into Western Sydney and the Gold Coast with new teams. It’s biggest weakness is outside Sydney and the Brisbane/Gold Coast area in regional areas of NSW and Queensland, which are rugby league strongholds. Viewers in regional areas of NSW and Queensland don’t watch games involving the Swans or the Brisbane Lions or other AFL teams, why does the AFL think they will watch the new sides from 2012?

TONIGHT: The ABC’s four hours or so of news and current affairs from 7pm. Ten has Junior MasterChef. Nine has The Farmer Wants a Wife. Seven has a split coverage: The AFL Brownlow Medal in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth and an hour episode of The Force in Sydney and Brisbane and then Body of Proof at 8.30. The Brownlow coverage should give Seven the night.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports