TXF didnt have football to contend with at 6.10 last week.


As an actual viewer (which is hard to come by on this thread) I feel the problem does not lie with scheduling. SCD went out regularly before 6pm last year and got 8-9m.

You dont have to agree with me but acknowledge it's a logical possiblity that with SCD; at this stage of the competition the dances being performed are Ballroom ie the Foxtrot, Quickstep which have a very specialist appeal and only really appeals to the hardcore dancing fans. It's in the later stages of the competition we have the Sambas, Salsas and Showdances that really have the WOW factor and their the dances that appeal to the general and majority audiences. In singing terms with TXF, it's like having 10 Leon Jacksons' being performed as oposed to 10 Leona Lewises.

I wouldnt expect the dances that were danced last night to sustain 10m viewers but towards the end they get more and more adventurous and spectacular which is when I'd say the vast majority of viewers get gripped. Take this for example; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXaPwhrAFic. It's just a completly different league to anything we have seen last night. Which is perfectly natural. Unlike TXF it's all a gradual work in progress.

I get the impression this is a very joyeous day for the Ratings Thread.

Yep, I thought Strictly held up well against the football. A 35% dhare against a match involving England is very good (even taking into account the poor opposition). I must say that the picture quality of the England match was quite appauling; ITV did improve in other departments, but also their scoreboard was quite bad.


I don't know where there was a deal regarding at least 7 mins, but if there was, it wasn't met. The post-match analysis was very rushed, but I've come to expect that from ITV.


Yes, I think it's unecessary for the BBC to have a LBUSA repeat just one day afterwards. They could have used that extra 30 mins to put back their preceeding shows. They would have rated better in the later timeslot.


Apologies if I sounded a bit harsh.

You forgot the credit crunch in your list of excuses

I'm no good at predicting ratings so I never take part in that game. I don't think I ever scored a point on it.

Doctor Who was going out in the summer and really early and yet got one of the highest audiences so far this year. BGT got a massive audience, that I never would have expected in May. I do think that some weeks SCD isn't helped by its scheduling.

To be fair, the Beeb appear to have seen sense this year by scheduling SCD at around 6.40pm, with last night's early start due entirely to the football and the need to combat that audience with a strong banker of their own and save Merlin. If, as the likes of GeorgeS would have us believe, SCD is only watched by grannies and ageing spinsters, then it was a nice bit of public service broadcasting to offer them a genuine alternative to the football, and allow Merlin (probably disproportionately popular with football-loving schoolboys) not to go head to head with the match.

And SCD's audience held up remarkably well anyway, beating the football.

25 minutes of post match on Champions League matches. I dont think any channel (BBC1 or ITV1) are going to do long post match analysis on a Saturday evening. Possibly they should do a post match ITV4 show.

Well I personally think that the best dancers I've seen have been on the US version of the show. I'd love to see the Brits and Americans in a dance off.

More like 10-15 mins when you take out all the adverts, competitions on offer, and the time taken promoting other shows . But, yes, I can sort of understand why it's 25 mins for Champions League matches. Last night's coverage was originally going to finish at 7.30pm, but then they changed it late in the day to 7.15pm. I would have preferred it to end at 7.30pm and get some more detailed post-match analysis.

I think ITV4 had a post-match analysis show at 10pm last season, but they got rid of it. Probably didn't rate well.

I think the lack of live continuity on ITV4 is a problem with live handovers. I would expect a 30 minute post match show or a 60 minute phone in on ITV4 would get better figures than what they showed.

Thats been suggested as a Christmas special format Winners Vs Winners. Altohugh I'm not sure where Mel B would fit in.

No, it's Michael Jackson next week. Though I guess the relevance thing stills stands.

Great ratings for ITV1 yesterday - but I can't believe the schedule they put out. Minus GMTV, CITV, the news and Family Fortunes, the day, between 5.15am and midnight was devoted to either F1, football or The X Factor.

05.15 F1 Qualifying
07.15 GMTV
10.05 CITV
12.50 The X Factor Repeat
13.50 News
14.00 F1 Qualifying Repeat
16.00 News
16.30 Football
19.15 The X Factor
21.15 Family Fortunes
22.00 The X Factor Results
22.45 News
23.00 Football Repeat

I guess that the channel kept it's audience for most of the day.

Merlin did brilliantly, everything else was a flop for BBC1 after SCD finished. I thought SCD would do slightly better than it did, but it still did well against the football. I think Casualty needs to be rested, running series after series is just stagnating the show. Why Channel 4 thought a show about buildings would be sucessful is anyone's guess, but I suppose they were aiming for an older audience than Merlin/Lottery and The X Factor were attracting.

I thought the football coverage was really good on ITV, and it was nice to have interesting pundits reporting on an England match, instead of Shearer, Hansen and Lawrenson. If BBC still had the football, all ITV would have done would be bring The X Factor forward to clash with it, so I doubt it'd have done better on BBC1 than it did yesterday.

Agent F asked for previous SCD ratings, I've found the odd one about the net. 5.45 start:

2006 Week Two: 6.5m (32.9%)
2007 Week Three: 7.5m (35.2%) - thrashing The X Factor 6.2m (30.9%) - this was week two for the X Factor, which started early (5.45, directly against SCD) due to the RWC final.

To be honest, I don't think many people will complain about the lack of post match analysis. ITV's coverage is so amateurish compared to the classier and more substantial offerings from the BBC and Sky that few people are going to bother watching anyway.

They might as well have gone straight to Ant and Dec at the final whistle...

I'd love to see Kristi Yamaguchi and Stacey Kiebler taking on Alesha Dixon and Colin Jackson.

One of my fave Kristi dances

One of my fave Stacey dances

How good would a British v American contest be with these two?

Further SCD ratings from last year (pre 6pm starts)

November 17th (5.50pm): 8.91m (41.6%) against The X Factor (8.51m, 35.2%) which started at 18:40. Cowell went on to call TXF a 'disaster' due to the dullness of the programme.
December 1st (5:50pm): 9.69m (44.6%, peak of 10.64m) against The X Factor 9.21m (37.2%) which started at 18.55
December 8th (5:45pm): 10.1m (47%, peak of 11.36m) against The X Factor (9.2m, 40%, peak of 10.66m) which started at 19.10.
December 15th (6:00pm): 10.4m (45.4%) against The X Factor Final (11.4m, 46.9%)

Don't forget it would have been impossible for the football to overrun on ITV1 as it meant X Factor would start late and it would mean a filler programme would get added in Scotland - STV never screened the match - most of the people in Scotland probably watched BBC1 for part of the night as a result.

When you actually compare back, Strictly Come Dancing is actually performing as it has in previous years. It will grow as the weeks go on and should match the great performances it put in last year. The difference is that X Factor, for whatever reason, has moved the goalposts a little this year. Its already hitting averages and peaks we don't usually see from either show until December.

Good to see that Merlin has established itself strongly on Saturday nights - its not a smash hit, but a solid, reliable drama that we can expect to see added to the BBC's rota of Saturday Night drama.

Apologies if this has been said already:

This thread is now the most viewed thread on the 'TV Programmes' sub-forum of DS!

That Kristi's a figure skater! She was always going to be good. Different footwork but shes a professional herself in all other aspects!

And yeah, I can see a UK v US special - the 'Champion of Champions' thing surely can't happen every year.

I'm wondering what BBC'll do in the spring for Saturday nights. No Doctor Who or ALW musical, which usually holds up the schedule pretty well. If ITV reintroduce Saturday Night Takeaway then (I'm not sure when it's returning) and air it alongside Primeval they could conquer early evening. But it appears that, after having SCD and X Factor clashing, both channels will be lacking the 'big Saturday attraction' in the New Year.

Well, it was just an easy win for England over Kazakhstan in a simple qualifier.

7 minutes is actually brilliant in comparison to BBC1's coverage of the Wimbledon mens tennis final, "the best match in the history of tennis" which went all through the afternoon and then had not one second of analysis so as they could show... a Vicar of Dibley repeat!

Woop Woop!

That's my contribution for the month.

This year the SCD single gender shows have moved to 4 rather than 2. Historically these shows havent had quite the feel of the later mixed contests and I think the ratings have been lower. I agree the show will grow and it must be remembered that SCD has had the beating of X F actor head to head for the vast majority of the times over the years. However you are right-this year X Factor has flown very early. Cowell and the show are so OTT now I dont think it necessarily matters who actually wins-its all that goes with it. X Factor is nowhere near as polished and technically correct as SCD but it has obviously struck a real chord with its audience quickly this year.
With regard to Merlin-again X Factor has dented it at birth-its a family show but its audience is apparently largely older-alot of its potential audience are gripped with X Factor and havent climbed on board from the start. Its superior entertainment and would command 7 or 8 million otherwise.

Maybe they should do a Richard & Judy special and shunt it on Watch?

Bloody 'eck, there's loads of posts to read today.

I think TXF benefits from the success of Britain's Got Talent. It's essentially the same show, so having managed to hook a stonking great audience for BGT - the reason for that being one of TV's great unanswered questions - is it not surprising that some of that audience has now tuned in to watch more of the same in the other Cowell show?

But by that theory, shouldn't it have enjoyed this sudden boost last year when BGT started? I think Cheryl has been a great addition, but I also think the show has been better made up until the live shows. Last year there were acts in the top 12 that I couldn't really remember. The search was far better edited and put together this year. The judges houses stage was far more dramatic than usual and I think the audience has been able to form a better connection with this years top 12 at an earlier stage. This is also in part because the talent stands out more than the past 2 years.

Production wise, last night was below par. Despite having a similar team producing, the live shows on Got Talent seemed far more polished than last nights XF. I would expect things to pick up as they progress, though. Taking 12 amateurs that have never been on TV before can always be a bit of a risk. Last night, their lack of experience showed.

But I think there may be another thing that works in favour of XF this year. Perhaps, amid all the gloom, people prefer to see "normal" people doing well?