Last night’s TV
ratings

The Winners Seven in quite a mixed night. Grey’s Anatomy (1.620 million)
was the most watched program. Home and Away was second (1.596 million), easily
beating Temptation (1.406 million). Seven News was third with 1.553 million,
then Nine’s A Current Affair (1.482 million), giving it a rare win over Seven’s
Today Tonight (1.446 million). Millionaire with Eddie McGuire was watched by
1.304 million.
The Losers

Ten, in spades. The new episode of The Simpsons was its
best performer with 1.2 million people. Numb3rs lost quite a few
numbers – well over 150,000 fewer people watched last night. The return of
Raymond in the 7pm slot did nothing to enthuse viewers: only 775,000 viewers
tuned in. Nine’s The Alice was another to suffer from viewer indifference: its
audience dipped below the 1 million mark to 975,000. Not a good omen.
Ten’s Law and Order continues to fade: a new episode down to only 696,000
viewers at 9.30pm. That fate awaits all popular programs. Viewers get bored,
eventually. No matter how Ten spins things, it was the second poor night in a row,
even if the verdict episode of Australian Idol lifted its audience slightly with
1.127 million people.
News & CA Seven News won nationally
because of wins in Sydney, Adelaide and Perth. ACA beat Today Tonight nationally – despite TT‘s big win in Perth – and in Sydney, a rare happening in recent weeks.
The ABC 7pm News did well (1.13 million) and The 7.30 Report clocked in with 974,000 people. Andrew Denton’s Enough Rope
jumped back above the million mark (1.072 million) with Geoffrey Robertson
droning on amusingly, while Four Corners and Media Watch were about average with
819,000 and 792,000 viewers respectively.
The Stats Seven won nationally 28.3% to 27.7 for Nine, 19.2% for
Ten, 17.8% for the ABC and 7.0% for SBS. Ten was beaten in Perth by the ABC and
drew with the ABC for third in the huge Sydney market, a very rare
occurrence.
Glenn Dyer’s
comments		 A total of 16 programs with a million or more viewers made for
a competitive night in the absence of
a big crowd puller like Desperate Housewives. Seven will be very happy with the
way Grey’s Anatomy is building. Ten will wear a straight face but it knows
there’s a leak developing and the ratings will list, AFL finals or no AFL finals,
until Idol peaks in late November. Even Ten’s hold on its 16 to 39 demographic
will come under pressure. Tonight it’s Seven’s Border Security and the last True Stories and Nine with CSI and Afterlife, which is
improving.


The Alice

cruels Nine’s Monday night

Nine’s
The Alice is well into its 22 episode run but
there are still quite a few viewers who don’t want to know about it. Take
last night. Temptation did good numbers for
Nine at 7pm, averaging 1.406 million viewers. But with
The Alice, which started at 7.30pm, more than 430,000 of those viewers fled to other
networks, though many returned in time for Eddie McGuire’s Millionaire
which was watched by an average of 1.304 million people.

Looking
at the quarter hour splits, the size of the turn-off and its possible impact on
the night for Nine becomes more apparent:

At 7.30pm, around 1.16 million people were watching Nine, which put the network in second
place.

By 7.45
to 8pm, Nine’s audience had dropped to 920,900 and the network had slipped to fourth place behind Seven, Ten (Idol) and the
ABC (7.30 Report).

Between
8 and 8.15pm, Nine’s audience fell to 908,100, which put it fifth and last (behind SBS where Mythbusters
was in repeat).

By 8.15
to 8.30pm Nine’s audience had started rising, up to 987,700 as Eddie McGuire
approached. Nine was still fourth.
And as
Grey’s Anatomy started on Seven and Ten’s Numb3rs kicked
off, Nine had battled its way back to third with 1.164 million people.
By 8.45 to 9pm, it was running second behind Seven.

Such
was the narrowness (0.6%) of Seven’s national win on the night, it could be argued
that The Alice cost Nine the night. Another
10,000 viewers might have made the difference. As long as it stays in that 7.30pm
timeslot on Monday nights, it’s going to be a tough for Nine to win clearly
on that night.