Really a night to forget — even the Inspector Morse repeat on 7TWO was probably a fifth repeat of the episode over the years. The mobile phone Sergeant Lewis was seen using in the ep last night was vintage talkie and has to be one of the earlier appearances of mobiles in a UK crime series. 

The results are not really noteworthy — Nine did OK, Seven did OK, Sunrise did very OK against Today. And why is poor overworked Karl Stefanovic on yet another break? Lisa Wilkinson is the glue holding Nine’s tottery breakfast effort together. In the metros, Sunrise had 308,000 viewers, Today just 258,000. Nationally Sunrise had 530,000, Today 404,000. Very weak.

The top five regional programs were: Seven News with 582,000, Seven News/Today Tonight with 500,000, Home and Away 3rd with 439,000, The Chase Australia 5.30pm, 388,000 and in 5th was ABC News with 342,000.

No AFL or NRL tonight, but watch the first episode of The Seven faces of Ambiguity on the ABC tonight to see if it is another attempt to remake The Slap? ABC News Breakfast and ABC radio have been giving this one a lot of promo, with previews and interviews (the commercials have nothing on the way the ABC promo machine creaks into action). After the way The Warriors bombed last night, there will be many at the ABC nervously awaiting the ratings tomorrow morning (and yes, I know it is the Good Friday holiday). Warriors could only manage 303,000 nationally, but that was ahead of Madame Secretary on Ten with 297,000.

Over the weekend we have AFL, NRL, the Stawell Gift race and hopefully lots of eggs and buns and a long rest. Insiders is off on Sunday morning and will return next week while My Kitchen Rules is back from Monday night.

Network channel share:

  1. Nine (27.0%)
  2. Seven (26.7%)
  3. Ten (19.7%)
  4. ABC (18.1%)
  5. SBS (8.5%)

Network main channels:

  1. Seven (17.9%)
  2. Nine (16.5%)
  3. ABC (12.6%)
  4. Ten (12.3%)
  5. SBS ONE (8.5%)

Top 5 digital channels: 

  1. 7TWO (5.0%)
  2. Gem (3.7%)
  3. 7mate (3.2%)
  4. GO (3.1%)
  5. ONE (3.0%)

Top 10 national programs:

  1. Seven News  — 1.61 million
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.48 million
  3. Nine News — 1.20 million
  4. Nine News (6.30) — 1.19 million
  5. Home and Away (Seven) — 1.12 million
  6. A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.06 million
  7. 7pm ABC News — 1.04 million
  8. The Chaser Australia 5.30pm (Seven) — 873,000
  9. Anh’s Brush With Fame (ABC) — 859,000
  10. Spy In The Wild (Nine) — 831,000

Top metro programs:

  1. Seven News — 1.03 million

Losers: Viewers of Ten, Nine and Seven. At least the ABC is having a go.

Metro news and current affairs:

  1. Seven News — 1.03 million
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 981,000
  3. Nine News (6.30pm) —909,000
  4. Nine News — 905,000
  5. A Current Affair (Nine) – 735,000
  6. 7pm ABC News – 699,000
  7. 7.30 (ABC) — 570,000
  8. The Project 7pm (Ten) — 540,000
  9. Ten Eyewitness News — 501,000
  10. The Project 6.30pm (Ten) — 357,000

Morning (national) TV:

  1. Sunrise (Seven) – 530,000
  2. Today (Nine) – 404,000
  3. News Breakfast (ABC,  160,000 + 85,000 on News 24) — 245,000
  4. The Morning Show (Seven) — 227,000
  5. Today Extra (Nine) — 155,000
  6. Studio 10 (Ten) — 128,000

Top five pay TV programs:

  1. Selling Houses Australia (LifeStyle) — 143,000
  2. Gogglebox UK (LifeStyle) — 79,000
  3. AFL: 360 (Fox Footy) – 76,000
  4. Paw Patrol (Nick Jr) — 56,000
  5. WWE Smackdown (Fox8) — 54,000
  6. Blaze and The Monster Machines (Nick Jr) — 54,000