Ten’s night thanks to The Bachelor (1.17 million viewers) and Gogglebox (1.15 million). Even though Seven won total people, that was due to solid numbers for its digital channels. In the main channels Seven and Ten shared the honours, but in the demos, Ten streaked ahead.

And that was the night … hold on, there’s the shame, sorry, the game in Melbourne. The best battle on TV last night turned out to be a one sided flogging of Nine’s Footy Shows by Seven’s The Front Bar. In fact, in football terms it was a humiliation as The Front Bar, which concentrates only on AFL, grabbed 471,000 national viewers against 328,000 for Nine’s Football Shows — both NRL and AFL. 

In Melbourne, The Front Bar had 261,000 viewers well over double the 116,000 for the Eddie McGuire fronted AFL Footy Show. In the three AFL markets of Melbourne, Adelaide and Brisbane, The Front Bar grabbed 378,000 viewers which was more than double the 173,000 for Nine’s AFL show. And Nine’s NRL Footy Show could only grab the grand total of 69,000 viewers in Sydney (46,000) and Brisbane (23,000 and sulking because there are no Queensland sides in the finals) for the night before the semi finals!

In the regions Seven News/Today Tonight was on top with 515,000, followed by Seven News with 508,000, then The Chase Australia and Nine News 6.30pm tied on 350,000, with A Current Affair at 337,000.

Network channel share:

  1. Seven (30.8%)
  2. Nine (24.1%)
  3. Ten (22.7%)
  4. ABC (15.4%)
  5. SBS (7.0%)

Network main channels:

  1. Seven, Ten (8.31%)
  2. Nine (15.5%)
  3. ABC (10.5%)
  4. SBS ONE (5.1%)

Top 5 digital channels: 

  1. 7mate (5.3%)
  2. GO (4.7%)
  3. 7TWO (4.3%)
  4. 7flix (2.9%)
  5. ABC Kids/Comedy (2.5%)

Top 10 national programs:

  1. Seven News — 1.423 million
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.401 million
  3. Nine/NBN News 6.30 — 1.207 million
  4. Nine/NBN News — 1.195 million
  5. The Batchelor (Ten) — 1.173 million
  6. Google Box (Ten) — 1.158 million
  7. A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.024 million
  8. 7pm ABC News —978,000
  9. Home and Away (Seven) — 900,000
  10. The Chase Australia 5.30pm (Seven) — 870,000

Top metro programs: None with a million or more viewers

Losers:  Nine and its footy shows, Ten’s Pointless — very apt.

Metro news and current affairs:

  1. Seven News — 915,000
  2. Nine News — 890,000
  3. Seven News/Today Tonight — 886,000
  4. Nine News 6.30 — 859,000
  5. A Current Affair (Nine) – 687,000
  6. 7pm ABC News – 645,000
  7. 7.30 (ABC) — 536,000
  8. The Project 7pm (Ten) — 524,000
  9. Ten Eyewitness News — 356,000
  10. The Project 6.30pm (Ten) — 280,000

Morning (National) TV:

  1. Sunrise (Seven) – 463,000
  2. Today (Nine) – 334,000
  3. News Breakfast (ABC, ABC News) — 261,000
  4. The Morning Show (Seven) — 202,000
  5. Mornings (Nine) — 131,000
  6. Studio 10 (Ten) — 77,000

Top five pay TV programs:

  1. AFL: 360 (Fox Footy) – 74,000
  2. Paul Murray Live (Sky News) — 65,000
  3. Credlin (Sky News)  — 55,000
  4. The Late Show With Matty Johns (Fox League). The Bolt Report (Sky News) — 55,000