Cricket on Nine hit for six by Seven

The Glenn Dyer breakdown: Last night, around 9pm, you would have heard cheers coming from the Nine Network’s command bunker at Willoughby: the Sri Lankans were on their way to victory in the second one day international final, and a third would be required from Adelaide on Thursday night. You beauty!

This morning, moans and groans at Willoughby and lots of questions. Seven’s female skewing programming, led by Home and Away, My Kitchen Rules and Packed to the Rafters, crushed the cricket. 900,000 to a million more people were watching Seven from around 7.30pm to around 9.30pm. I thought Seven would win, but the result would be much closer.

“Never again,” was heard in the Cricket Australia bunker, no more World Series Cricket style competitions involving Australia and two other countries which goes deep into March and the start of the football season. Sunday night’s 1.2 million plus audience for the first final’s evening session seems to be an aberration up against the 728,000 for last night: a fall of half a million.

On Thursday, Seven has My Kitchen Rules then Grey’s Anatomy. The night will be closer because of the win/lose nature of the match for the competition. But Cricket Australia is the loser.

Last night the belief that the Australian cricket team is a permanent big drawcard on TV was demolished by viewers. They just didn’t want to watch. At some stages the cricket was running third (from 7m to 8pm and from 8pm to 9.30pm, behind Seven and Ten). The cricket finished 8th in Sydney and Melbourne, 9th in Brisbane and just inside the top 20 in Adelaide and Perth.

A further question for Nine this morning is what will advertisers think? TV contracts these days have ratings targets.

At the moment the Seven Network has a better idea of what viewers want on their TV screens than Nine or Ten does. Don’t underestimate the importance of this outcome last night.

Tonight: Not much really, except My Kitchen Rules and Please Marry My Boy. Ten has The Biggest Loser. Nine has a Sherlock movie from 2009. Will it do better than the recent three telemovies on Nine, or are Australians really Sherlocked out? Kitchen Cabinet on ABC 2 at 9.30pm, just before the Metallica special at 10pm and after the Lilly Allen one at 9pm. Curious programming.

The top 10 national programs (metro & regional combined):

My Kitchen Rules (Seven) 2.544 million
Packed to the Rafters (Seven) — 2.274 million
Seven News — 1.984 million
Nine News — 1.856 million
Today Tonight (Seven) — 1.690 million
Home and Away (Seven) — 1.490 million
The Biggest Loser (Ten) — 1.251 million
NCIS (Ten) — 1.223 million
ABC News — 1.223 million
Cricket: Australia versus Sri Lanka (session 2) (Nine) — 1.210 million

Metro Winners:

My Kitchen Rules (Seven) (7.30pm) — 1.826 million
Packed to the Rafters (Seven) (8.30pm) — 1.548 million
Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.353 million
Seven News (6pm) — 1.353 million
Nine News (6pm) — 1.261 million
Home and Away (Seven) (7pm) — 1.034 million

The Losers: The Biggest Loser (Ten) (7pm) — 864,000 and more than 1.2 nationally, beat the ODI cricket on Nine. Now who’s the biggest loser?

Metro News & CA: The ODI cricket on Nine meant Nine News had bigger wins in Sydney and Melbourne. But Seven News still won Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.

Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.353 million
Seven News (6pm) — 1.353 million
Nine News (6pm) — 1.261 million
ABC News (7pm) — 873,000
Ten News (5pm) — 673,000
7.30 (ABC) (7.30pm) — 544,000
Foreign Correspondent (ABC) (8pm) — 493,000
The Project (Ten) (6pm) — 456,000
Insight (SBS) (8.30pm) — 220,000
Lateline (ABC) (10.30pm) — 189,000
SBS News (6.30pm) — 168,000
Dateline (SBS) (9.30pm) — 157,000
The Business (ABC) (11.05pm) — 122,000
SBS News (10.30pm) — 93,000
The Drum (News 24) (6pm) — 32,000

*On News 24 simulcast

In the morning:

Sunrise (Seven) (7am) — 423,000
Today (Nine) (7am) — 364,000
The Morning Show (Seven) (9am) — 177,000
Mornings (Nine) (9am) — 100,000
The Circle (Ten) (9am) — 54,000
Breakfast (Ten) (7am) — 45,000
News Breakfast (ABC) (6am) — 41,000 (+15,000)*

*On News 24 simulcast

Metro FTA: Seven (3 channels) won with a share of 37.4% from Nine (3) on 23.3%, Ten (3) on 21.9%, the ABC (4) ended on 12.0% and SBS (2) finished with 5.5%. Seven leads the week with 34.3% from Nine on 26.8%, Ten on 18.9%, the ABC, 15.5% and SBS, 4.6%. Main Channels: Seven won with 30.8% from Nine on 17.8%, Ten with 16.4%, ABC 1 on 8.3% and SBS ONE on 4.3%. Seven leads the week with 27.7% from Nine on 21.3% and Ten on 14.2%. ABC 1 is on 11.9% and SBS ONE, 3.6%.

Metro Digital: 7TWO won with a share of 4.0% from GO and Eleven on 3.1%, 7mate was on 2.7%, ABC 2 was on 2.5%, Gem was on 2.4%, ONE was on 2.3%, SBS TWO was on 1.2%, ABC 3, 0.6%, News 24 on 0.5%. The 10 digital channels had a total FTA share last night of 22.7%. 7TWO leads the week with 4.0%, from GO on 3.0% and Gem and 7mate on 2.6%.

Pay TV: Seven (3 channels) won with a share of 31.2% from Nine (3) on 19.4%, Ten (3) on 18.3%, Pay TV (200 plus channels) was on 13.8%, the ABC (4) ended on 10.0% and SBS (2) was on 4.6%. The 15 FTA channels had an 86.2% share of TV viewing last night, with the 10 digitals channels on a low 17.5% and the five main channels on 68.9%

The top five pay TV channels were:

Fox 8 (2.44%)
Fox Classics (2.13%)
Nick Jr. (1.64%)
Sky News (1.62%)
Crime & Investigation (1.59%)

The five most-watched programs on pay TV were:

Coronation Street (UKTV) — 80,000
Eastenders (UKTV) (7pm) — 76,400
The Walking Dead (Fx) (8.30pm) — 76,000
Eastenders (UKTV) (6.30pm) — 72,800
The Walking Dead (Fx) (9.15pm) — 63,400

Regional: Prime/7Qld (3 channels) won with a share of 35.1%, from Nine (3) on 27.4%, SC Ten (3) ended on 21.1%, the ABC (4) was on 11.8% and SBS (2) finished with 4.6%. Prime/7Qld won the main channels with 26.7% from WIN/NBN on 21.1%. 7TWO won the digital with 4.9% from GO on 3.6% and 7mate on 3.5%. The 10 digital channels had an FTA share of 25.1% in prime time last night. Prime/7Qld leads the week with 34.2% from WIN/NBN on 29.0%. The ODI cricket also flopped in regional areas as viewers preferred the female friendly programming on Prime/7Qld.

The five most-watched programs in regional markets were:

Packed To The Rafters — 726,000
My Kitchen Rules — 717,000
Seven News — 631,000
Nine News — 597,000
Cricket: Australia versus Sri Lanka (session 2) — 482,000

Major Markets: Seven won everywhere, overall and the main channels. Ten was second in the main channels in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. Ten was second overall in Adelaide and Perth. 7TWO won Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide. ONE won Perth. Seven leads the week everywhere and has it won.

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

*Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports