The Winners: 9 programs with a million or more viewers. Nine won easily. Seven gave it away and finished third. Seven News was tops with 1.394 million people. Today Tonight was second with 1.332 million and Ten’s Rush was third with 1.320 million at 8.30 pm. Nine’s 20 to 1 was fourth with 1.164 million and Australian Idol finished the semi finals with 1.153 million at 7.30 pm. Seven’s Home And Away was sixth with 1.132 million at 7 pm, just in front of the repeat of Two And A Half Men on Nine with 1.123 million with Getaway surprisingly weaker in 8th at 7.30 pm with 1.016 million. Nine News finished 9th with 1.009 million (very close to falling out of the million viewer club). A Current Affair was out of the million viewer list for a second night with 982,000. The Footy Shows averaged 953,0900 and 405,000 of those in Melbourne. Seven’s The Amazing Race averaged 914,000 at 7.30 pm and continuers to get lost with viewers.

The Losers: Losers? Seven, Double Take, 608,000 at 9 pm, TV Burp, 681,000 at 8.30 pm. Terrible figures. My Name Is Earl, 556,000 at 9.30 pm. The Suicide Tourist on the ABC at 8.30 pm, 440,000. A miserable program and got what it deserved. Q&A by contrast was uplifting and full deserved the 497,000 people who watched,

News & CA Seven News again won nationally and in every market as did Today Tonight. Nine was very weak last night in Sydney and Melbourne between 6 pm and 7 pm (See below). The 7 pm ABC News averaged 991,000, The 7.30 Report, 826,000. Lateline, 291,000, Lateline Business, 164,000. Ten News At Five 863,000. The Late News/Sports Tonight, 342,000. World News Australia, 159,000, the 9.30 pm edition, 125,000. 7 am Sunrise, 382,000, 7 am Today, 304,000.

The Stats: Nine won with a 6 pm to midnight All People share of 30.2% (27.8%) from Ten with 25.9% (19.9%), Seven was third with 23.2% (24.8%), the ABC was on 15.7% (15.2%) and SBS was on 4.9% (10.7%. The 5th test last week). Nine won everywhere and Seven now leads the week, 28.0% to 26.2%. In regional areas a similar result; WIN/NBN with 30.4% from Southern Cross (Ten) with 24.9%, Prime/7Qld with 22.4%, the ABC with 15.5% and SBS with 6.8%.

Glenn Dyer’s comments: An easy win for Nine, handed it too them by Seven’s very weak programming from 7.30 pm to 9.30 pm. Double Take and TV Burp have had their chance. They are embarrassing in places. They are making Rush on Ten look good, and it’s not in the same class of Nine’s Rescue or City Homicide on Seven, and yet it is getting numbers that are as good.

But Ten won 16 to 39, 18 to 49 and 25 to 54s, leaving Nine to win All People with lots of old people (as Seven often does).

As poor as the night was for Seven, and as self-inflicted was the third place, the damage being done by Nine to its News and A Current Affair hour seems odd. For the third night in a row it was week and for the second night in a row ACA was watched by less than 1 million viewers. The 7 pm ABC News had more viewers than ACA nationally for the second night in a row and came within a few thousand of beating Nine News after finishing on top on Wednesday night. The 7 pm ABC News had more viewers (271,000) in Sydney than either Nine News (269,000) or ACA (229,000). The 7.30 report in Sydney had more viewers (277,000) had more viewers than the 7 pm ABC News, Nine News or ACA in Sydney.

Nine News also had more viewers in Melbourne, 326,000 to 305,000 for Nine (that’s unusually low). Deal Or No Deal finished in front of Hot Seat again, 708,000 to 616,000, but that’s not why Nine News and ACA were weak from Tuesday onwards and especially last night and especially ACA these past two nights.

Nine’s Sydney News boss, Darren Wick was quoted in the The Tele as seeing a positive from the performance on Wednesday night. he said that clearly there’s an “audience shift, but its up and down. Before it was all one way traffic for Seven, so we’re back in the game.” On the performance of Wednesday and Thursday night, Nine’s performance between 6 pm and 7 pm in Sydney is close to its lowest for the year, as it was when Peter Overton started reading news after Mark Ferguson was shafted.

TONIGHT: AFL, NRL, but watch George Gently on the ABC at 8.30 pm. Movies and other on Seven and Nine when there’s no football in those markets (NRL in Melbourne, AFL in Sydney). Ten has been forced to move the US version of So You Think You Can Dance to 10.30 tonight because it was being ignored by viewers with better things to do, such as wash their hair or clean out the kitchen cupboards. The 7 pm Project is Ten’s hilite tonight.

SATURDAY: Another Australian rugby ‘triumph’ on Seven from Perth, NRL on Foxtel, AFL on Ten. Nothing on the ABC except the repeat of Foyle’s War at 10.10. In fact if you don’t like AFL or NRL and are bored by pay TV, or don’t have it, Foyle’s is the viewing highlight of a very dull night except for Nine which has the Hairy Blotter movie, The Order of the Phoenix, which will do very well at 7.30 pm. But I’m not a Blotter fan. Too much flying.

SUNDAY: The chat shows in the morning are always worth a watch (so you can talk to the TV if Piers Ackerman or the Bolter show up on Insiders). 60 Minutes might actually be worth a look tonight. There’s a story on a young woman who leapt to her death after going through a self improvement course. It’s created a lot of publicity in Sydney. The Clive Palmer profile won’t tell us any more about a man who was once a whiteshoer in the bad days of Queensland, and the story on the collapse of Iceland is a year too late and again, we won’t learn a single thing. Rescue Special Ops will be tested again by Midsomer Murders on the ABC at 8.30 pm. Rescue though will be worth staying with, if you can’t stand silly murder stories from mythical Britain. Idol is on Ten, plus Rove, go for Rove. Seven has Dancing With The Stars; nothing else.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports.