Four million like it!

They've now corrected this.

Thanks, I didn't realise Corrie won last year. I'd expect EE to be ahead this year, but Corrie to still be ahead regularly.

The Chase is down for 6:40pm on ITV press til 7:40pm. Suggests The X Factor will start at 7:40pm.

Makes sense considering there will be one less singer. However ITV would be best starting TXF at 7:30pm and The Chase at 6:30pm so it starts on the dot when Strictly is on.

ITV give Strictly such an east ride. Last week a new episode of YBF got 1.8m at 6:30pm, leading into The Chase at 7pm.
YBF should be scrapped on the main channel and moved to ITV2 where it performs well.

To at least give a stronger schedule ITV should be doing something like this:

5:10pm ITV News
5:30pm Tipping Point rpt
6:30pm The Chase
7:30pm The X Factor
9:50pm The Jonathon Ross Show
10:50pm ITV News

The News gets the jump on BBC News, Tipping Point gets the jump on Pointless, The Chase starts dead on 6:30pm same as Strictly, and TXF starts at 7:30pm so that +1 can follow at 8:30pm directly after Strictly finishes.

That would strengthen the schedule and be better than what they are doing now.

The XF needs to lessen the clashes not increase them.

Decent for Grantchester but not fantastic. It has a little bit of room to fall but not much. New Tricks has stabilised just shy of the 5m mark - why is BBC One Northern Ireland throwing it about all over the place? Too Tough to Teach? is letting down Channel 5 somewhat but Channel 4's figures look mediocre in the 8pm hour. Have they paid BARB to keep their figures under wraps from 9pm? I think The Kitchen might be a grower.


I don't think a 7.40pm start is an improvement on a 7.30pm slot; indeed, I think it's slightly worse as they don't have a +1 crossover. They may as well either look to avoid Strictly entirely or use +1 to their advantage - not lessen a clash which in turn hurts their early evening and means less people may use the +1 option.

I am sure tomorrow will be talk of ITVBe.

I was wondering that too - and if the Belfast branch of the BBC knew something about this series of New Tricks that we didn't. Maybe it rates disproportionately badly in Northern Ireland and that's why they chose to displace it. You'd think something like DIY:SOS on Tuesday 21st would be more suitable to move, but then again that rates quite highly (and might do better than average in NI). As a side note, I believe BBC One generally does worse over there, and UTV really well. That was historically the case, anyway.


See my reply at 18:33 to Dancc's post which contained that rating.

Wouldn't say it was a "peak time of the year" especially, the clocks haven't got back yet and it's still light at five o'clock. I think it's a bit odd we got repeats again after a month of new episodes but they're still making them by the truckload so nobody's losing out. The repeats at the moment are from January 2013 and are getting their first repeat, so it's not like people will remember them and illustrates they're showing plenty of new episodes. The public aren't complaining either.


Eh? But they forget they've got bored of it over the weekend and come back the next Monday?

Anyway, One Show ratings from Monday 22nd to Friday 26th September, from Broadcast...
Wednesday - 3.68m
Tuesday - 3.65m
Monday - 3.56m
Thursday - 3.40m
Friday - 3.39m

So no, that isn't the case. It's obvious why it usually gets lower ratings on a Friday, because it's a Friday and more people are out (and no, it's not because of the presenter, whose radio show they dominate is the most listened to thing on the whole of British radio). Even if there is a decline, there's hardly a massive one, losing about 150k from Monday to Friday.

No news update tonight, EastEnders started a minute or two late and went straight into the BBC Music thing that has been advertising for ages. Which turned out to be this year's Children in Need single. http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/med...s/lovebbcmusic

Love the original - they did this with Perfect Day by Lou Reed about 10 years ago. Love it, amazing. It's things like this which make me so happy we have the BBC in this country.

Plus if they tried to air it at 8.30pm on Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday they'd be cutting in on an hour long programme. Surely New Tricks is a better performing show than the 9pm comedy combination?


Thanks. I'm surprised DS didn't report that or 8 Out of 10 Cats.

Incidentally it wasn't quite three minutes long (2m 45s approx.) so it won't count as a programme in its own right on BARB.

Fantastic production, very reminiscent of Perfect Day as mentioned (without the heroin-linked lyrics).

If they lessen the clash then they will be pushing after 10pm. Better to clash with Strictly at 7:30pm so +1 is available on time and dent Strictly in the process, than push it too far back, give Strictly a free run, weakening their early evening line-up and thus finding TXF goes lower anyway because its on to late.

You do realise we're going to both look very stupid on Sunday morning if +1's figure is miniscule? Though I'm already preparing a slight defence by saying it needs to be promoted.

Great minds.

We both concluded the same within moments of one another based on our adjacent posts .

Of course, we could both be wrong!

Boxing Day would be ideal IMO. That is when nobody wants to do much but often gets asked to parties to play games etc. I think there would be an audience to watch others do that instead.

You are not really in the mood for anything heavy after Christmas Day's exertions.

Sorry, I was talking about the three previous 60-minute NI opt-outs on the 1st, 22nd and 29th Sep; one of them could have taken DIY:SOS 's slot.

I suppose a 90-minute documentary about the Dunlop family of motorcycling fame wasn't considered suitable for a Friday night. It is quite tragic in parts, according to the write-up. (I know that Silent Witness has aired on that night and is often grim, but that's a bit different in being drama).

Northern Ireland's small population means it makes little difference to the overall ratings, although it seems to be buggering up the timeshift UK-wide somehow (along with possibly Scotland), although that's yet to be confirmed.

Edit: Ignore me. I found the answer!

(...the answer was Black Mirror.)

Oh right, sorry. Maybe DIY: SOS is more popular in Northern Ireland than New Tricks?

Just about satisfactory for Grantchester considering the Its weekly reach crisis. However its breakdown doesn't bode well for next week. I predict it will rate below New tricks next week.

Dramas do normally lose viewers across that slot. I hope it holds up decently next week but New Tricks may just edge it. Possibly around 5m each.

Considering it wasn't long ago you were telling us Grantchester was DOA because of New Tricks, for it to beat New Tricks by a million is still worth noting I think.

Also Grantchester may get a boost for episode 4 onwards once New Tricks is done.

It might be. I don't think our regular sources could help with that one because BBC One Northern Ireland isn't available to search on (for example) Attentional's site, Overnights.tv.

This might be because it's a small population (c. 1.8m) and therefore the demo breakdowns etc that they produce might be inaccurate based on a small sample (about 146 BARB boxes). Would be nice to get some overall numbers though.

Our Girl and New Tricks both finish that week. Maybe they're planning to strip a three part drama across Sunday, Monday, Tuesday the following week.


Speaking personally, I think Chris Evans' Radio 2 show is ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT and makes going to work in the morning (groan!) a pleasure. But I can't say I take to him too much when he's on television. Maybe he's simply got the perfect face for radio. Mind you, I wouldn't give The One Show the time of day whoever's presenting it.

I doubt NT gets more than 100,000 viewers in NI but the Nations are allowed to opt out even during peak viewing time (although they wouldn't be allowed to drop EE or SCD). I believe it was a very good documentary and a coup to get Liam Neeson.

Maybe. There's Remember Me, a three part mystery with Michael Palin and Julia Sawalha, which could be stripped.

That would leave them with three dramas to air before Christmas - The Game, The Missing and Last Tango in Halifax. Can't see all three starting the same week, although there would be three open slots. I can see The Game starting Sunday 2nd November, The Missing starting Monday 3rd, and Last Tango returning Tuesday 18th November (with something, maybe DIY:SOS, filling the two Tuesdays before that.)