Early starts could signal the end for Sunday. The Eddie McGuire touch lives on at the Nine Network. How else are we to explain a piece of silly re-programming that has emerged from Willoughby. Nine’s venerable Sunday program, which has almost been axed twice in recent years, is moving from 9am (where it has started every Sunday morning since it went to air in 1982) to 7.30am in a move that will probably see it die a slow lingering death. It will finish at 9.30am and Nine is planning a Sunday morning sports program to link into the Footy Shows and other sports programming, especially during winter. The Sunday morning sports program was an idea McGuire was pushing and he got a dedicated sports reporter, Stephanie Brantz, dropped into Sunday. One of the selling points internally was to move Sunday forward to start before the much stronger Weekend Sunrise starts on Seven at 8am and get viewers early. That also gets Nine’s political content to air before its increasingly stronger rival, Insiders, starts at 9am. But Sunday‘s strongest period in recent years has been from 10am onwards, after Weekend Sunrise finished, when Sunday’s audience rose sharply and attracted tens of thousand more viewers. Sunday was averaging around 200,000 viewers, sometimes up around 230,000, while Weekend Sunrise was averages in excess of 400,000 viewers with its more populist approach to news and events. That won’t change this year, especially when Sunday isn’t being given any additional resources or people to replace those who have left. Having been involved with Business Sunday at 8am and less so with the old Small Business Show on Nine at 7.30am (killed off by Gyngell in 2002), I know how tough it is to get people to watch at that time and how few people do: less than 100,000 nationally some mornings. I feel another cost cut looming later this year as Nine’s owners, CVC, react to an expected 30% fall in Nine’s earnings. — Glenn Dyer

Ten’s drama boss moves on. Ten has confirmed what had long been whispered in TV land: that its drama boss, Sue Masters, is moving on. She is the second senior executive to leave after Shaun James, who was bumped from the sales boss position when Vance Lothringer was appointed, left at the end of last year. Basically there was nothing on the drama slate for Masters as Ten heads down the reality route. So You Think You Can Dance has chewed up a lot of the budget, along with The Biggest Loser, Big Brother and Australian Idol.

Last night’s TV ratings
The Winners: Nine programs with a million or more viewers as the tennis continues to do the job for Seven. The afternoon tennis helped Seven News top the most watched list with 1.377 million, ahead of the 7pm ABC News with 1.239 million. Today Tonight was next with 1.213 million, followed by Seven’s night tennis (1.199 million), Nine News (1.099 million), A Current Affair (1.072 million), the repeat of Cold Case (1.071 million), Nurses on Nine at 7.30pm (1.043 million) and Police Ten7, a cops show from NZ (1.023 million).

The Losers: Given the tennis last night it was a surprisingly strong night of viewing. Burn Notice, Ten’s much hyped US spy drama sank to 772,000 at 9.30pm. The repeat of Friends at 7pm was more popular with 903,000.

News & CA: Seven News was comfortably ahead everywhere but Melbourne. Today Tonight lost Sydney and Melbourne but won elsewhere. The ABC News won Melbourne for the second night in a row and ran second to Seven’s tennis coverage. The 7.30 Report averaged 907,000. Ten News averaged 905,000; the Late News/Sports Tonight, 409,000. Nightline, 334,000. SBS News, 198,000 at 6.30pm; 134,000 at 9.30pm. 7am Sunrise, 381,000; 7am Today, 293,000 (within 100,000 of Sunrise).

The Stats: Seven won with a share of 31.3%, from Seven with 27.0%, Ten with 22.4%, the ABC with 15.4% and SBS with 4.0%. Seven won all five metro markets but it was very close in Adelaide where the tennis wasn’t strong. Seven leads the week 34.5% to 24.0% for Nine. In regional areas a win to WIN/NBN for Nine with 31.3% from Prime/7Qld with 30.7%, Southern Cross (Ten) with 20.7%, the ABC on 13.9% and SBS on 3.5%.

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Tennis isn’t very strong for regional audiences, that’s why WIN/NBN won last night for Nine with a fairly tired line up. Even the fact that Ms Sharapova is a rather attractive player failed to make a major impression on the bush audience. Will Federer vs Blake do it for Seven in the bush tonight? Or with lots of rain in some growing areas are people too busy to watch TV? Tonight it’s tennis or a mixed bag on Nine and Ten. The ABC and SBS are wastelands. Seven’s tennis audience is up 6% on the depressed levels of 2007.

Source: OzTAM, TV Network reports