That's better than I expected for Demons, although I still can't see it coming back. Interesting that it beat In It To Win It, despite the latter being over 3 million ahead of the former in total viewers.

TV Burp is significantly ahead of everything else, which doesn't really surprise me.

As for Demons being ahead of Robin Hood and Merlin, like others have said, remember that they were against The X Factor. I'd imagine that Demons is behind what Primeval was getting last time in 16-34s, though.


Nor can I. It's looking likely that the runs of these two will cross over. It would be silly to have them clashing, although if they did, it would be veryinteresting to see which of them won. My money would be on Primeval, but ratings can be very surprising, and a lot of it would depend on the other shows in the schedule.

I was comparing the 16-34 averages for the series. Demons has averaged 0.9m so far.

Yes, ITV should bring back The Big Match Live with the iconic theme tune to give their football a brand seeing as they have more than ever this season.

Yes I agree. That was stupid on my part.

But what about a highlights programme on Sunday evening after their main game in every round.

3:30pm The Big Match Live (still 30 minute build-up) / family movies
6:00pm The Last Word
7:00pm Emmerdale
7:30pm Coronation Street
8:00pm The Royal
9:00pm Ladies of Letters
10:00pm News at Ten

That leaves Saturday for reality shows (maybe they could do this next year):-

12:00pm On the Ball
12:30pm The Big Match Live / Bond movies
2:30pm World of Sport
5:15pm Weekend News
5:30pm Regional News, Weather & Sports Show
6:00pm You've Been Framed (permanent slot)
6:30pm Dancing on Ice
8:00pm Harry Hill's TV Burp (sandwiched, will get over 8m)
8:30pm Dancing on Ice: The Skate Off (before 9pm is important)
9:00pm Saturday Night Live (the only risk of this ITV schedule)
10:00pm News at Ten

Also, 'Fantasy Football' would get around 500,000 viewers, if shown at 10pm after every football night on ITV4. It would just spice it up a bit. I always remember John Lydon's appearance

So you were. must... read... properly....

But, as Demons' ratings are continually dropping, maybe you should wait until the end of the run before comparing figures for a fair comparison. Also, as others have pointed out, Merlin was on against X Factor, one of this age group's most popular shows, whereas they're obviously much less interested in In It To Win It, the top-rated Saturday programme yet not even in the top 5 for 16-34's.

An all premiership tie, Wigan vs Chelsea was the live Saturday night BBC match in the equivalent round last year.

5.1m (26%) was it's overnight rating.

5.39m (27.8%) for Man Utd v Tottenham last night.

Amid all the publicity that both teams would be putting out weakened teams, that doesn't seem that bad.

Close between the news bulletins then with ITV narrowing the gap to under 300k. Shame it wasn't a weekday!

Man Utd v Spurs is a much bigger draw than Wigan v Chelsea. If both ties were shown on the BBC at primetime, I reckon the Utd match would have got at least 1m more viewers.

A fairer comparison would be to the Aston Villa v Man Utd match last year for the 3rd round, which got 7.4m (36%). Similar teams, but it's 2m down.

Ah, so ITV got a better average anyway.

Silly Robby Sykes...

We can't read too much into the FA Cup ratings yet. The big ties haven't come along yet. ITV getting 5 million is respectable enough but their coverage is rubbish, but that's a personal grievance. Steve Rider and Andy Townsend are Mogadon television. :yawn:

Just realised that in my previous reply to your reply I didn't apologize for misquoting you, so I do.

Well an early evening k-o can only be shown on Saturdays by ITV as it wouldn't leave enough room for the full 2 and a half hours of coverage of ice dancing celebs on Sundays...


Well, Wigan v Chelsea is hardly the same as Man Utd v Spurs as a draw. But yes, it did get almost identically low ratings and share. ITV1 did show a Harry Potter film and You've Been Framed/TV Burp (which pulled a stronger-than-2009 6.7m/7.4m) against it so it had strong Saturday teatime competition.

I remember it was a miserable, drab encounter that match which probably drove the figures to unusually low levels. Indeed, here are some extracts from the BBC Sport report:

"The opening half was highly forgettable with Joe Cole's first-minute shot the only real effort of note. The Wigan pitch looked in a poor state and unfortunately the quality of the football in the first half was no better. With a wide, boggy stripe running right down the centre of the field, it was perhaps unsurprising that neither side opted to pass their way through it. But that made for a scrappy, fragmented match as the ball spent a fair amount of time pinging about in the air."

No surprise people stuck "hilarious home video howlers" on instead...

For anyone wondering, here are Setanta's FA Cup ratings so far this weekend:

Friday:
19:15- Derby County v Nottingham Forest (SS1): 275,000 (1.4%)

Saturday:

Setanta Sports 1
19:30- FA Cup Extra: Kettering Town v Fulham: 55,000 (0.3%)

Setanta Sports 2
12:00*- Hartlepool v West Ham Utd: 7,000 (0.08%)
17:05*- Man Utd v Tottenham: 21,000 (0.11%)

* available in Scotland and ROI only


Honestly, you don't need to apologize .

And those figures are Scotland only [except Virgin Media didnt block the coverage in England yesterday]

Well I think we've all learnt a little ratings equation from last night:

Insipid Saturday Night TV = Insipid Saturday Night Ratings

Really only the traditional bankers - Harry Hill, Casualty and the Lottery did anything like pleasing figures.

Demons is flopping now. I am going to praise ITV for the effort to produce Saturday Night drama, and I personally don't think the slot is wrong - its a good concept aimed at a good family audience. Its just the excecution which has been flawed and produced a pretty slow, dull show.

I too am looking forward to the returns of Primeval and Robin Hood to see how they fare - the latter in particular, given its much nicer scheduled run. I wouldn't have thought it would be in eithers interests to clash - surely if BBC and ITV can keep 90-120 mins plus each of SCD and XF apart, two dramas shouldn't be too difficult.

I'm slightly surprised the FA Cup didn't rate better for what is - outside a "big four" clash, about as attractive as games come. I was expecting 6 million plus, especially considering the short post show. It is more difficult for ITV to hype up events like this as effectively as the BBC could - they just don't have the same reach across TV, Radio and Online to exploit it so well. Their production seems to be pretty heavily criticised too. With the advertising crunch and these underwhelming numbers, the FA deal isn't looking so great for ITV at the moment. They'll be hoping for some big interest in the next set of England matches.

I think the first trail went out on Thursday night, as it was recorded on Thursday daytime, during the recording session for the show.

I thought they might have run a trail (with clips of old shows) for a week beforehand, but perhaps Thursday was the day JR's suspension ended, so they decided not to run any trails before that date?

Unless you count every news bulletin on every channel (tv & radio) for about 3 days.

I didn't see anything on the BBC News until the day before and I never saw any trailers either. But lots of promotion does not a hit show make as Demonkickers is proving.

Interesting article in one of the papers about daytime tv audiences rising as unemployment levels rise. The problem for the commercial channels is that the audience is not very attractive to advertisers so they dont benefit much from the higher ratings.

Who cares?
It's just one more reason to dislike it.
I hate programmes which are designed to kiss the asses of their oh so precious 16-34 audience.

Just concentrate on making good programmes instead of all this cynical obsessing over 16-34 viewers to pander to the advertisers.
Make good programmes and everyone will flock to watch them whether they are aged 16-34 or not.

Exactly.
It's as though the very act of trying too hard to target a particular demographic of viewer is probably the very same thing which loses them.

Just make a good programme and everyone will watch it.
Percentages mean jack shit if your ratings are very low.

You'll end up getting more of this treasured 16-34 demographic if the overall ratings for a show are very high. The percentages of 16-34 year olds will mean nothing then as hard numbers will mean low percentages of this particular demographic watching this particular show will be a hell of a lot more in actual numbers than a high percentage of them watching a show with poor ratings.

Exactly that is what broadcasting is all about. Appealing to a certain demographic is narrowcasting.

Looks like ITV will show the Everton v Liverpool FA Cup replay on Wed 4th Feb.

Great match, should easily get over 5m.


I agree with you that it's important first and foremost to make a good programme, which Demons is not.

However, I was simply stating the 16-34 ratings because ITV do take interest in those because it's what advertisers want. It's clear to see, though, that Demon's ratings are not good enough.

Great it means I can watch it. I already pay for Sky, I'm not paying for Setanta as well. Also that is a very tasty cup tie so should do well.

Yes, it's a mouth-watering tie so I think it could get over 6m, particularly if it goes to Extra Time and penalties.

I don't think Five will be too chuffed as Minder will be premiering that night!

But trying too hard evidently doesn't work. As I illustrated above.
A good show which gets good ratings is going to get more 16-34 viewers than a shit show with poor ratings which has a high percentage of 16-34 viewers.

It's this trying to specifically target the 16-34 demographic with such obsession which I feel harms the quality of shows.