The Winners: No Commonwealth Games in the million viewer list for Ten. The early evening again averaged poorly with just  569,000. The late evening recorded an OK 725,000 viewers. If these lowish audiences continue for Ten, these will be the last games seen in prime time on Free To Air TV. Who would want to show the games from Glasgow in 2014? Pay TV that’s who. Glasgow in 2014 though would be in the new all digital era, so who needs what structure we will have for TV by then.

  1. Packed to the Rafters (Seven) (8.30pm) — 1.671 million
  2. Seven News (6pm) — 1.299 million
  3. Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.214 million
  4. Top Gear (Nine) (7.30pm) — 1.149 million
  5. Four Weddings (Seven) (7.30pm) — 1.109 million
  6. Nine News (6pm) — 1.098 million
  7. A Current Affair (Nine) (6.30pm) — 1.084 million

The Losers: Ten, the Games audiences in the early evening were rotten, just over half a million for three hours. Foxtel again did well, as did ONE which won the night. Ten has sacrificed 400,000 or more viewers an hour from 6pm to 9pm in running the Games, especially from 7pm onwards.

News & CA: Seven News and TT were again weak in Sydney, losing to Nine News and ACA. Seven News and TT won the rest of the metro markets. ACA beat TT by 70,000 viewers in Sydney. TT‘s audience sank to just 266,000. In Melbourne the 7pm ABC News had 329,000 viewers, against Nine’s 322,000 and Seven’s 347,000. That’s the daylight saving lag at work.

Sunrise had another big win over Today in the morning as people in NSW went back to work and everyone adjusted to daylight saving. Ten is really paying for dropping The 7pm Project during the Games. It could have been the ideal focus for the night’s viewing and for interviews of medallists etc and a bit of out and about reporting.

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.299 million
  2. Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.214 million
  3. Nine News (6pm) — 1.098 million
  4. A Current Affair (Nine) (6.30pm) — 1.084 million
  5. ABC News (7pm) — 993,000
  6. Ten News (5pm) — 743,000
  7. The 7.30 Report (ABC) (7.30pm) — 699,000
  8. Foreign Correspondent (ABC) (8pm) — 627,000
  9. Lateline (ABC) (10.35pm) — 228,000
  10. Insight (SBS) (7.30pm) — 210,000
  11. SBS News (6.30pm) — 144,000
  12. SBS News (9.30pm) — 131,000
  13. Lateline Business (ABC) (11.10pm) — 120,000

In the morning:

  1. Sunrise (Seven)(7am) — 378,000
  2. Today (Nine) (7am) — 280,000

The Stats:

  • FTA: Seven won with a share of 31.6%, from Nine on 27.4%, Ten with 21.0%, the ABC on 15.8% and SBS with 4.3%. Seven now leads the week with 29.2%, from Nine on 28.2% and Ten with 20.7%.
  • Main Channel: Seven won with a share of 26.5%, from Nine on 20.9%, Ten with 16.2%, ABC 1, 13.5% and SBS ONE on 3.5%. Seven leads the week with 24.2% from Nine on 22.4% and Ten with 17.4%.
  • Digital: Another solid night thanks to ONE’s games coverage, helped by a good figures for GO. ONE topped the night with 4.8%, from GO on 4.5%, 7TWO on 2.8%, 7Mate on 2.3%, Gem with 2.0%, ABC 2 on 1.3%, SBS TWO with 0.8%, ABC 3 with 0.6% and News 24 on 0.4%. That’s a total FTA share of 195%, with Perth the best market where the digital channels had a total share of 24.8%, followed by Adelaide with 21.7% and Melbourne on 20.9%.
  • Pay TV: Seven won with 25.3%, from Nine with 21.9%, Pay TV and its 100 channels were on 17.1%, Ten on 16.8%, the ABC on 12.6% and SBS with 3.5%. That left the FTA channels with a share of 82.9%, made up of 15.7% for the nine digital channels and 67.2% for the five main channels.

Major Markets: Another solid night for the digital channels and for Foxtel in the metro markets with its Games coverage. It’s share in Sydney of 21.9% matched that of Seven (it had won the night before) and its three channels (main channel, 7TWO and 7Mate). Ten’s ONE won the digitals in Sydney, Brisbane and Perth. GO won Melbourne and Adelaide. 7Mate and Gem shared the minors. In the main channels and overall, Seven won from Nine and Ten everywhere bar in the main channels in Perth where ABC 1 snuck into third slot. Nine leads Seven and Ten in Sydney and Brisbane, the NRL markets, Seven leads Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth, the non NRL markets.

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

Glenn Dyer’s comments: At least there was some colour and movement on Ten. Apart from Seven’s Packed to the Rafters and Seven Ages of Britain on the ABC at 8.30pm it was a dreary night of TV.

Foxtel is having a gloat about the improvement in its audiences with the Games. The boost to Ten’s ONE sports channel and the lack of a meaningful boost to Ten’s prime time audiences, tells us that the Commonwealth Games are marginal now for most Australian sports fans. But Ten has made a blunder in not having something non-sport (but Games linked) at 7pm.

Ten’s prime time audience off by more than 30% on last week. A disaster in the making financially? It is already that in terms of ratings. It’s a long way to the closing ceremony.

TONIGHT: More games on Ten, the final episode of the off cuts of Spicks and Specks. No The Gruen Transfer. All on the ABC. City Homicide on Seven, The Block on Nine. Games also on Pay TV. Another fairly desperate night tonight. The IT Crowd returns at 9pm on the ABC. It’s a droll comedy, but more than OK to fill half an hour of your time if the Games bore you.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports