I think purely saying its down to ad breaks is burying your head in the sand a bit. Its a brand/repuatation issue mixed with ad breaks. Simulcasts with no ad breaks on ITV have still seen a huge difference between BBC1 and ITV1 figures. You only have to see how ITV1's ratings nosedive on every Tuesday last Saturday and the 9pm show last night. There is very little viewer loyalty for ITV1.

No. The brand leader in football is Sky Sports (at least for real football fans). The BBC is an after thought in live football now.

ITV competes well versus Sky Sports.

For those simulcasts (which are royal events) most people do not know that ITV are providing the coverage on an ad-free basis (apart from the minority who do research on the internet). Most people will just put on BBC1 to ensure that the bloke from Go Compare doesn't appear just as the royal couple are about to say "I do" or kiss on the balcony. For the last two simulcast royal events (royal wedding and jubilee procession) ITV's coverage has received more critical acclaim, even from "neutral" papers such as the Guardian & the Mirror.

There is an expectation that ITV's output will be littered with sponsorship and advertising, even when it isn't, and ITV will never be able to get that message across.

Last Saturday BBC1 was showing the Andy Murray match up until 11pm. That's nothing to do with brand loyalty - it's just British interest in a sports event for which the BBC happen to hold the rights. ITV's rating for the Champions League final (featuring Chelsea) is evidence of this.

It kind of confirms that BBC One will be handing over to the news channel at Midnight, with the bulletin at 00:00 and then Sportsday at 00:15.

It all looks to be good stuff, I've got days booked off work to watch a lot of the coverage, I'm hoping we can celebrate the positives in this thread.

im keeping Line of Duty on my PVR for the Olympics.

When did I mention BBC was the brand leader in football or mention Sky Sports? Totally different discussion.

The fact is your argument about adverts being the sole reason for the BBC's dominance in simulcast matches is nonsense. Adverts alone dont cause 6 times more people to watch ad-free coverage on the other side.The actual match average ratio between the two broadcasters actually increased slightly. If viewers hated adverts so much then ITV would never get the high ratings it does or even compete with the BBC.



Its a lack of brand/viewer loyalty for ITV1. BBC1 has never fallen to 1.2m at 7pm or under 1m at just after 10pm on a Saturday night. There is a reason why BBC1 always holds up better than ITV1 when it faces huge competition and its not always better programming.

A lot riding on Superstar over at ITV.

Scheduled for 7 consecutive nights from July 14. Saturday 8-9pm (Auditions), Sunday 8pm-9.30pm (Auditions), Mon-Fri 9pm-10.30pm (Live Shows).

Film fans will be disappointed to note that The Dark Knight isn't currently scheduled and now looks unlikely to air before July 21. The Dark Knight Rises hits cinemas July 20.

19:30 - Coronation Street: 8.52m (37.0%), +1: 233k (1.0%)
Excellent for this time of year and almost as good as the soap rates in the middle of winter. I know CS has been messed around by the Euros, but this figure is excelllent.

Well we were talking about football and you said
and then
so its not unreasonable to draw the fact that ITV1 gets up to 50% of SS homes watching ITV when there is a simulcast. So clearly if ITV can do that against the brand leader "Sky Sports" then they should be be able to do equally well against a non-brand leader "BBC Sport" [your words].

The only thing different is BBC1 carries no ads and SS does.

Confirmed:

Live Football - Women's Team GB vs Sweden - Friday 20th July - BBC One
Live Football - Men's Team GB vs Brazil - Friday 20th July - 19:30 to 22:00 - BBC One
Live Basketball - Team GB vs USA - Thursday 19th July - 19:00 - BBC Three

And also:

Saturday 14th July
BBC One
17:30 - Pointless Celebrities
18:15 - BBC News & Weather
18:30 - Film: Indiana Jones 2
20:20 - Secret Fortune
21:10 - Casualty
22:00 - BBC News & Weather
22:20 - Mrs Brown's Boys (r)

ITV1
17:30 - You've Been Framed!
18:00 - Primeval
19:00 - The Cube
20:00 - Superstar Auditions
21:00 - Nation's Favourite Number 1
22:30 - ITV News & Weather
22:45 - Mad Mad World

Sunday 15th July - ITV1
19:00 - Emmerdale
19:30 - Coronation Street
20:00 - Superstar Auditions [vs Countryfile]
21:00 - Nation's Favourite Number 1

Wednesday 16th July
- Victoria Pendleton: Cycling's Golden Girl at 9 on BBC1.
- Britain's Secret Treasures at 8 on ITV1.
- Meeting Ian Brady at 10 on Channel 4.

Thursday 17th July
- The Truth About Sports Products and Crimewatch at 8 and 9 respectively on BBC1.

Thanks to Elgin for the above.

That isn't the case - certainly from my experience ...

There is always a BBC executive producer on an independent commission, who will sign off on scripts, and may view rushes ... but it's very unusual for them to have a constant physical presence throughout filming. They'd view the cut delivered to them by the production company and give notes but that's that.

The BBC executive producer on Blackout is the new head of drama for BBC Scotland.



Interesting to see how many people switched off across the hour. I doubt I can be bothered to watch more.

If ITV's coverage was as good as your implying it is and viewers only choose BBC because of the adverts then why dont viewers switch back at kick-off to watch the actual match on ITV1? The ratio actually increased from 6:1 to 6.15:1 for the match coverage. Do people actually not hate Mark Lawrenson's commentary as much as some make out?

Also, why has the ratio increased from 3:1 for Euro 2004 Final, 5:1 in 2010 for the World Cup Final to now 6:1?

I'm not implying anything. Its the hassle of switching probably.

You asked why - I answered it the ads mainly. And proved it by demonstating that ITV coverage holds up much better versus SS which you agreed has the best production values, in homes which have access to both Sky Sports & ITV.

Now you dont want to accept that but rather than counter my arguements you are just quoting back the figures.

You are like a doctor that just tells you that you are ill rather than suggesting what the cause is. I think I could manage that myself thanks.

It IS the middle of winter where I live this week

I have to agree, that does look excellent. How does that compare to this time last year?

Slightly unrelated but I've just found a top 70 programmes list for UK Gold on week ending 18th March 2001. Some very good ratings - shows how popular UK Gold was just 11 years ago, with no programme under 0.11m, and The Bill being the top show on 0.41m. Soap repeats doing very well on UK Gold. One of the popular channels on digital at the time.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/infor...6/uk-gold.html

In comparison, rival archive channel Granada Plus in the same week, with Emmerdale at the top with 0.19m.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/infor...us.html?locale

There's a load of top 70 multichannel ratings from that week, plus BBC1 top 70 from the week ending 25th Mar 2001 unaggregated with shares: http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/infor...546/bbc-1.html

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/information/?page=12

Thanks for that.

I bring good news for all Casualty fans

last Saturdays episode, has been rescheduled for this Saturday


and I have been given a personal assurance from Wimbledon, it wont over run again

Will this be the episode which Mo Farah appears on?

Oh, I posted that before I'd read the new Radio Times and I note that Call The Midwife isn't actually on next week. With presumably nowhere to stick them during the Olympics and seemingly none scheduled before then it looks like they've taken action and dropped them completely. Perhaps they'll shove them on Sunday afternoons or at 10.35 during August.


Yet there used to be, I know I always say it but my gran used to have it on all day and people were really loyal to the channel, ITN was like a family and of course you had all the regional identities. You can't go back to the latter but ITV have made huge miscalculations in recent years by chasing the young audience too aggressively and messing around with the soap schedules and annoying the heartland audience they used to mop up, which has mostly defected to BBC1.

Pretty average all round last night really. The soaps all received abit of a bounce in the absence of the Euros, especially the 19.30 Corrie. With +1, it was just over 8.7m. That's a very strong rating for July.

EastEnders started at 7:31 and ended at 7:57

I reckon it will be a hit, as ITV's legendary PR operation and a decent amount of advertising on the streets rolls into operation. It also has a free run against a 31 year old film repeat.

I think 7m, and it might actually rate better than latter episodes of The Voice over its run.

Which would be ironic...

Murray to be second on Centre Court tomorrow after Federer, so probably around 4.30/5. Could cause havoc with the BBC News at Six and Regional News as they will most likely keep it on BBC One with it being a quarter final.