The Winners: Even in summer Thursday nights are typical. Just five programs with a million or more viewers, compared to eight earlier in the week. Tonight it will be down to three or four and maybe one or two tomorrow night. Nine News was tops at 6pm with 1.434 million, boosted by the cricket. Today Tonight was next with 1.384 million, benefiting from the absence of A Current Affair and beating the cricket on Nine. Seven News was next with 1.208 million and Two and A Half Men were supposedly fourth with 1.050 million but the cricket seemed to run past 8.30pm. Seven’s tennis coverage averaged 1.013 million from 7.30pm and definitely cleaned up after 8.30pm, but the cricket won from 6.30pm to 8.30pm. And anyone wondering about the 11.30am start for the cricket from Perth, it’s all about Nine wanting 6.30pm start for the final session. There’s no other reason. Surely those ABC radio commentators wondering about the start time could work that out for themselves? The Bette Davis story on the ABC was very good at 8.30pm and the Agincourt history program at 9.35pm was top notch. Only 450,000 people watched, which was a pity.

The Losers: Viewers on a Sunday morning (moving right along). Only Weekend Sunrise is on air. Why can’t the ABC and Nine surprise us all by bringing back an hour of chat about politics and sport? Don’t cite budgetary restraints, it doesn’t wash any more. It’s just lazy programming. Kevin and Wayne are back working, the cricket and tennis are on, so there’s plenty to talk about. Come on, surprise us, we deserve better.

News & CA: Nine News’ win was due to the cricket lead-in and Seven News won Adelaide and Perth. The 7pm ABC News fell below 1 million people to average 944,000. The 7.30 Report was also hit by the cricket and tennis and it fell to just 667,000. Ten News, 701,000; the Late News,/Sports Tonight, 457,000. Nightline, 260,000. SBS News, 161,000. 7am Sunrise, 395,000; 7am Today, 268,000.

The Stats: Seven won the night 30.8% to Nine’s 28.9% because the tennis did well after 8.30pm. Ten was third with 20.0%, the ABC was on 15.2% and SBS on 5.1%. Nine won Sydney and Adelaide, Seven won Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. But in regional areas a win to Nine through WIN/NBN with 31.0% from Nine with 29.4%, Southern Cross (Ten) with 19.7%, the ABC with 14.5% and SBS on 5.4%.

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Another day and night dominated by tennis and cricket. And it will be the same today and over the weekend. The cricket will have to go to day five on Sunday for Australia to have a chance of winning and setting a new record of 17 test victories in a row. That would ensure good figures for Nine. Nine’s cricket audiences are down from last summer’s Ashes figures, as was expected. Lleyton Hewitt plays Saturday night which should mean good numbers for Seven. Two programs stand out over the weekend. The powerful Clint Eastwood movie, Million Dollar Baby is on Sunday night after the cricket. And Parkie’s last program is on the ABC on Saturday night at 10.10pm. Now I would have thought that Parkie’s last ever program would have deserved at least a start at 9.30pm or earlier. He has been a stalwart for the ABC (and others) for years. So it must be a load of cods, or the ABC believes viewers just don’t care any more. If that’s the case, why did it buy this series? I would have preferred to watch Parkie’s Meg Ryan interview and Andrew Denton’s interview with Parkie, which told more about him than watching the thousands of interviews he has done.

Source: OzTAM, TV Network reports