This week a notable event happened in Melbourne: the Nine Network panicked and moved its ailing AFL Footy Show not to Wednesday night (as it has previously done when there is an AFL game scheduled on Seven for Thursday night), but to Tuesday night. This moves it away from the now usual head-to-head clash with Seven’s The Front Bar (both have gone head-to-head on Thursday nights).

It was an admission that the AFL Footy Show is dying on its knees and the ratings reflected that — just 249,000 viewers (in Melbourne 134,000) nationally. That meant that The Front Bar had the night to itself and gathered 504,000 viewers nationally, including 285,000 in Melbourne which made it the third most watched program in the market and nationally.

Last night, Nine’s night as The Block (1.36 million) easily dominated viewing with the only challengers The Bachelor on Ten with 1.06 million and Anh’s Brush With Fame on the ABC with 1.03 million. In regional areas, Seven’s 6pm News had 555,000 viewers, Seven News/TT 514,000, The Chase Australia from 5.30pm had 387,000, The Block 385,000 and ACA 369,000.

Network channel share:

  1. Nine (28.5%)
  2. Seven (27.7%)
  3. Ten (20.2%)
  4. ABC (16.9%)
  5. SBS (6.6%)

Network main channels:

  1. Nine (21.2%)
  2. Seven (19.7%)
  3. Ten (13.7%)
  4. ABC (11.8%)
  5. SBS ONE (4.4%)

Top 5 digital channels: 

  1. GO, ONE (3.6%)
  2. 7TWO (3.2%)
  3. Eleven (2.9%)
  4. ABC Kids/Comedy (2.8%)

Top 10 national programs:

    1. Seven News — 1.551 million
    2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.483 million
    3. The Block (Nine) — 1.365 million
    4. Nine/NBN News 6.30 — 1.282 million
    5. A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.225million
    6. Nine/NBN News — 1.219 million
    7. The Bachelor (Ten) — 1.062 million
    8. 7pm ABC News — 1.038 million
    9. ANH’s Brush With Fame (ABC) — 1.020 million
    10. Home and Away (Seven) — 962,000

Top metro programs: None with a million or more viewers

Losers: Seven

Metro news and current affairs:

  1. Seven News — 996,000
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 967,000
  3. Nine News 6.30 —949,000
  4. Nine News — 909,000
  5. A Current Affair (Nine) – 856,000
  6. 7pm ABC News – 709,000
  7. 7.30 (ABC) —595,000
  8. The Project 7pm (Ten) — 513,000
  9. Ten Eyewitness News — 408,000
  10. The Project 6.30pm (Ten) — 311,000

Morning (National) TV:

  1. Sunrise (Seven) – 460,000
  2. Today (Nine) – 337,000
  3. News Breakfast (ABC, ABC News) — 258,000
  4. The Morning Show (Seven) — 214,000
  5. Mornings (Nine) — 152,000
  6. Studio 10 (Ten) — 69,000

Top five pay TV programs:

  1. Gogglebox Australia (LifeStyle) — 174,000
  2. AFL: 360 (Fox Footy) —74,000
  3. Paul Murray Live (Sky News) — 63,000
  4. Mayans M.C. (showcase) — 62,000
  5. Selling Houses Australia (LifeStyle) — 61,000