The BBC have pencilled in their first FA Cup Round 1 tie for Friday 7th November at 7:30pm on BBC Two:

"MOTD Live: FA Cup First Round

The oldest and greatest domestic cup competition in world football returns to BBC television for the first time since 2008, with live coverage of one of the outstanding ties from the FA Cup first round.

This stage sees League One and League Two sides enter the competition. Those 48 teams will be desperate to avoid falling victim to a giant-killing from the non-league clubs, who have progressed through the qualifying rounds."

Good to see it back on the Beeb. The Friday night slot means they avoid clashing with the Premier League which is good news, although it does mean a demotion to BBC Two.

I am a bit suprised they are not on BBC1 on Saturday but Friday might be ok on BBC2.
Cant wait for the "not as good as when it was on ITV" posts.

The football will disrupt Gardeners' World and QI, but the latter took two weeks off last November anyway (for Children in Need on the 15th, and the following week for a repeat of a Culture Show Doctor Who special, timed for the eve of the 50th-anniversary episode).

It's hard to say what will happen as the CL has been a Tuesday or a Wednesday slot certainty for ITV since 1993. They could carry on treating Tuesday as a weak night, but Tuesday has never really been a great night anyway even in the pre digital world, when ITV filled up two hours with a TV movie or imports.

Er..... doesn't this just change Tuesday into Thursday and Thursday into Tuesday? The low-budget (low-audience) factual still has to go somewhere. And Thursdays post-Emmerdale haven't been brilliant since Corrie moved back to Wednesdays, almost another flop-zone. Aside from Paul and Birds, everything else in the 8.30 slot has been a disaster, including the soap compilation programmes that you would have thought would have had a big audience overlap with 8pm Emmerdale.

And as for 9pm - Breathless bombed, Chasing Shadows bombed and I fancy The Great Fire will bomb too (at least from a ratings perspective). It looks far too "For Schools & Colleges" to attract a mass audience.

And you are aware that if ITV move Emmerdale from 8pm Thursday to 8pm Tuesday, the BBC are quite capable to move Holby to Thursdays? Also, where are these half-hour "strongish gameshows" going to come from?

Soldier, Soldier is one ITV Tuesday hit of yesteryear that I can remember.

Tuesdays at 9pm on ITV used to be one of their strongest slots of the week with Peak Practice, Soldier Soldier and Boon (all made by Central) all pulling in very big ratings.

Which also begs the question as to why either side dont use movies/tv movies and imports more. They have lots of space to fill and BBC particularly have shown some decent movies after midnight.
And while I remember are ITV ever going to show Dark Knight?

Stephen Mulhern is apparently available 24hrs a day, 7 days a week to keep pumping them out so it will be no problem.

US ratings: The Flash had good second week retention losing just 0.2 in the demo with a 1.7, tying SHIELD which aired an hour later.

New comedy Marry Me debuted after the Voice on NBC with an solid 2.3, while About A Boy returned after with a 1.7 which was slightly up on where it finished last season.

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/201...d-down/315328/

Well over six years now since that came out at the flicks. I can only think they're waiting to premiere that and Dark Knight Rises together (the latter was released in July 2012). It's very odd though.

Thanks, Neil. Quite pleased with myself for remembering it got 4m!

And all 9pm weeknight dramas. ITV's problem is not having enough of these. Samuel mentions returnable drama hits in these types of slots. We know he's right as we've all said the same thing. It's a problem for BBC1 too as they never have enough successful one a in the Autumn. You hardly ever see drama on a Tuesday on ITV through the year.

All true, but I wasn't suggesting they should have an hour of ED on Tuesdays, just that if they did, they might be better off splitting it instead of having it in one chunk.

Of course, they might make an extra episode and have two double bills every week.

Maybe they will show it on the same week BBC shows Car Share?

well 6 episodes a week is just not enough.

The Tuesday numbers do seem to be getting worse for ITV and there have been some notably strange decisions for the 9pm slot. In general it feels like Richard Klein hasn't done much to improve factual output on ITV not only on Tuesdays but across the board.

Next year will be very interesting. Aside from Elaine Bedell's entertainment team, all ITV commissioning teams had a major shake up last year when Alison Sharman and Laura Mackie left. 2015 is definitely time for the new department heads to start delivering some hits.

Well ITV cant be as bad in 2015 as they have been this year - its just not possible !!!

I assume the BBC are terrified that imports and films on a regular basis in prime time will be met with a wave of “is this what the license fee is spent on” negative press from some corners. I think that's potentially quite a valid concern for them although it would be nice to see more films played in prime time on the channel away from the festive period. Although that might be the other issues BBC1 in particular seems content to save its film premiers for the Christmas/New Year period where they tend to be most effective. The other issue for both broadcasters I suppose is the rise of the digital channels (both their own and others) eating up a lot of this content. Having said that I still think ITV should look at buying in some imported content to help re-establish Tuesday night. It seems like the most cost effective way to get some original scripted content on the night and to help create some sense of stability. Not that I have any real suggestion on what it is they should buy for that slot though at this point.


That seems like an odd strategy if its the case.

I wonder if perhaps the issue is that The Dark Knight is too long and thus difficult to schedule? Its 152 minutes long and I can't imagine its something they're going to be able to start pre-watershed. With that in mind even with only a 20 minute ad load and no news break its going to be midnight by the time it ends. I also wonder if they might have this problem with Skyfall when that lands with them given that its 142 minutes long and again tricky to see airing pre-watershed. The Dark Knight Rises is going to be even worse because its an impossibly long 165 minutes.

I think the problem with factual is the scheduling of it. Some of these single docs would play better after News At Ten.

Having said that it feels like Klein is still commissioning for BBC4 rather than mainstream ITV. They also need some returning drama hits. Next year will see Doc Martin, Foyle's War and Broadchurch back. But so far they are better at miniseries than drama series.

I do think though that ITV's drama department isn't performing anywhere as badly as Channel 4's. They have had an awful couple of years. If they can't get a hit in 2015 with their upcoming dramas, which on paper look good, they never will.

Was that the series in which he plays a maverick detective with a complicated home life, a taste for the booze, an eye for the ladies, and a prim new sidekick who does things by the book? Or am I getting it mixed up with something else?

I must have missed their Hot Tub season.

They can't seriously be waiting that length of time because the can't find a slot good enough.

With Skyfall I think starting it at 9pm (Saturday) after a big drama/entrainment programme etc., with the news at 10:30pm-10:45pm with the film finishing around 11:40pm.

Being a Saturday in Winter there is more likely to be viewers staying up longer. I think it will end up airing during the Xmas holidays.

Perhaps a Sunday before a Bank Holiday Monday is the best place for ITV to put a long post-watershed film. More people in, and they could run the news at 20:45 or something.

On Fridays and Saturdays most people don't have work the next day, but for that very reason many of them are out.

Overall films just don't perform like they did for BBC1 and ITV. Due to content restrictions many films have to be shown after 9.00 and ITV have had too many disasters wrapping films around the news. Otherwise they have been seen too many times before they even get to terrestrial. Its the films that stand multiple showings that are the most favoured, and the BBC do well to limit their offerings to Christmas premieres imo.