There's no point in comparing what happens in America to what happens in the UK, it's a different society. As mentioned, Christmas TV is virtually non-existent in America and all the channels pack up on about December 10th, and all the Christmas shows are the sappiest, most cliche-ridden programmes imaginable.

Yes, they used to do it in the seventies but that was a different era - especially in Scotland where Christmas wasn't the major holiday, that was Hogmanay. Even in those days it didn't happen that often - there was a full fixture list on Christmas Day 1976 but I don't think any of those matches were actually played, they were all moved to other days. And before that you were in an era when Christmas Day was just like any other day. Comparing the logistics to what happened in the fifties and sixties is daft too, when football grounds were in the middle of a residential street.


Well, nobody's saying that, but it's not that much different to a normal week, is it, in terms of the amount of content? There's plenty of big entertainment and drama in a regular week on ITV. In terms of cost I can't imagine the figures are that different between Christmas week and any other week of the year, which certainly won't be the case with the Beeb.


The Darling Buds had run out of steam a bit by Christmas 1992, I remember someone writing into the Radio Times after that special to say he was a huge fan of HE Bates and would like to make it clear that he had nothing to do with the special - they'd run out of stories to adapt and were writing new stories, not always hugely successfully. Actually that House Party, which I think got its biggest ever rating, is on YouTube and one of the items is Joe Longthorne performing with a singing dog. The golden age of Saturday night telly, right there. The year before Last Of The Summer Wine was on a Friday, and Summer Wine on any night other than Sunday seems all wrong. It used to be that Friday was a bit of a dead night on BBC1 and series would be punted there to die. I've said it before but I knew Russ Abbot was on his way out when his series was moved to Fridays.

But when the Darling Buds were in their pomp, in 1991, that Christmas show was I recall in all the provisional schedules for Christmas Day, then at the last minute they shunted it forward - swapping it with Watching - as they presumably thought it would be a waste to show it on Christmas Day when there was still ad revenue to be had.


Of course, I hope we're not taking the dates in that article as gospel, because they absolutely won't be. The Mirror know as much as we do.

So the same crap effort as the last few years? A special BOAF along with Christmas specials of LE shows. Wow ITV.

Noel's House Party beat Darling Buds Of May and helped Summer Wine. Darling Buds was massive that year and peaked with 18m. Most expected Darling Buds to win and beat House Party easily. That edition got 15.93m and if it wasn't for Darling Buds would have cleared 16m.

Darling Buds had around 9.7m on the day I believe.

From Broadcast:

Ordinary Lies: 2.9m (12.9%)

Including +1:
What Britain Earns with Mary Portas: 1.1m (5%)
Ben Fogle: New Lives in the Wild: 978k (4.3%)
Cutting Edge: One Killer Punch: 810k (5.6%)
Breaking the Silence Live: 690k (3.2%)

Speaking of The Darling Buds of May, do you have the ratings for the complete series Ray?

Edit - oh and what was the exact share for I'm a Celebrity last night? Thanks.

Is this not a bit greedy? What if CTM starts to delcline, not that is should do massively, but three series in one go.

I think so.


Broadcast says 8.3m (37%) for IAC, but does that mean 37.0%?

Surely Downton was stuck with the same cast, CTM's has been changing over time and no doubt they will leave another behind when in Africa in this Christmas special

After Bake-Off, I imagine that Beeb executives will be doing more multi-season deals. Seems you can't trust anyone these days!

Tuesday is the only day it hits 30%+ shares. All the other days it can be anwhere between 27%-29%

Last night it faced Fishing Impossible on ITV which was sub 2m, so its not like its got muc to compete with. Whereas Emmerdale has The One Show which is over 4m.

This is where the situation with TXF and SCD come into play. The younger skewing show is struggling, whereas the older skewing ones are stronger.

The Darling Buds of May

7.4.91: 16.68m
14.4.91: 16.84m
21.4.91: 18.35m
28.4.91: 18.22m
5.5.91: 17.01m
12.5.91: 17.23m

22.12.91: 16.44m

26.1.92: 18.73m
2.2.92: 17.95m
9.2.92: 17.81m
16.2.92: 18.01m
23.2.92: 17.44m
1.3.92: 17.88m

26.12.92: 9.69m

28.2.93: 13.81m
7.3.93: 14.31m
14.3.93: 14.09m
21.3.93: 15.46m
28.3.93: 14.37m
4.4.93: 14.48m

The Darling Buds was a fantastic series. I wasn't very old whe it finished, but I love watching the rpt's on ITV3.

I would love it if ITV did a one-off special to revisit the Larkins. Something like that on Boxing Day would surely give ITV a strong audience?

On a different note, isn't it today tha we will start to see some provisional schedules? I hope this year we see no sign of YBF on the ITV main channel. Its been featured far too often. I remember on NYD in 2014 I think it was ITV shown a full hour rpt of YBF. Lazy.

Some clubs would have no trouble putting on a game. Obviously they schedule the right game for it and work with the police, council and transport authorities. My club would have no trouble with parking and traffic, it'd be easier now than in the 50s for sure.

I'd imagine some park and ride would be put on too. It's really not hard for some cities. Now whether a club would want the extra cost when they could get the same crowd in on Boxing Day is another matter. That's why TV would have to be a driver of it. Though a club might like the extra day between games by playing a day earlier.

We aren't there yet and we aren't at the point yet where foreign TV pays more money than UK TV. Maybe it'll change when those two things happen. Maybe it won't.

But it's certainly doable and I reckon sky or BT would get their normal 700k - 1.2m rating. Plus those who've escaped to the pub.

If I remember right it was one of the firat shows to consistently top the charts ahead of the two soaps. Bread was another. The latter I used to really like in its early days. Darling Buds on the other hand....

Best of luck getting the cast together again (without which it would hardly be a draw). I imagine CZJ alone would pretty much blow the budget!

The Sun - in 'Cha Cha Chuck Balls' - a silly (even for them) 'exclusive' - today claims from an insider at Strictly that the judges are trying to get rid of Ed Balls to try to stop him winning given overwhelming popularity at home.

Problem is that - whilst I am sure they are miffed and by this point know that the viewers usually start losing interest in the comedy acts and focus on finding the worthy winner - the show cannot be fixed, however the paper hints that they might be trying to do so.

Why? Because the story of how falls apart when you read it.

The bosses have added an extra dance where the contestants are eliminated one by one and get fewer points the earlier they go out.

But this happens every year when there are fewer contestants to spice up the show and give a decent running time. They have a different dance style each year.

So this has not been created as a master plan to get rid of Ed.

They justify how it has by saying the group dance will be a cha cha - one for which Ed scored 'well below everyone else'....but, um, that is like every week then as the judges have clearly done their best to underscore him against the others every week.

The source tells the Sun that this masterplan is 'almost definitely set to place Ed bottom of the judge's leaderboard.'

Which, again, is like he would have done anyway and has been doing regularly. So this 'plan' is not resulting in anything that has not been happening before.

The problem is that even if he gets bottom marks in the studio if enough people vote him high up the list at home he avoids the dance off. He has allegedly been winning the public vote and, to be honest, stories implying the show want him to resign to let better dancers go through are simply going to make that more likely - not less - as it will fire up the viewers at home to rebel and organise voting campaigns.

They probably are desperate to avoid him making the final three where the public decide not the judges. But if so then they will just keep scoring him bottom and hoping his viewer votes drop off enough to get him into the dance off, where anyone opposing him would then probably go through.

The whole idea of a plot to make this happen is really silly and potentially could even lead to the opposite effect if viewers believe the press tale and vote for him even more in protest.

I think you're seriously underestimating the number of people who need or prefer public transport to get to games. Other than a Merseyside derby with the two clubs walking distance apart I can't see the absence of public transport not having an effect. And I really don't think there's the appetite for it anyway. We're long past the days when blokes could disappear for 5 hours while their wives dutifully did everything to ensure the Christmas dinner was ready for them the second they got home. And Premier League viewing figures have already dipped this season. Why would there be a sudden burst of enthusiasm for a televised game on Christmas Day with all the competition both on and away from the box?

David Jason wouldnt be cheap either

Why? It's no skin off their noses who wins. This is what I don't understand about any of these conspiracy stories. Nobody gains anything from influencing the result. Literally nobody! The judges know how it works and are well used to being second guessed by the public. Their jobs are secure whatever the result. Why should they give a fig?

There would be park and rides I'd imagine and maybe a few special busses. A nice pay day for some drivers.

Is there an appetite? Probably not but football doesn't worry too much about little things like that. Whether there is money in it is more pertinent and again, I'm not sure there is.

Viewing figures are down though I think they've recovered to normal levels now. The competition on Xmas Day reminds me of the competition on a Saturday evening or up against GBBO and Corrie. Not a whole lot of crossover. And I Imagine the game might be as much for American or Far Eastern TV.


But hey, I'm not saying it's going to happen soon, I just thought it was interesting that it was discussed on sky which might suggest the idea is being mooted - maybe by foreign owners.
I just thought I'd pass it on to here. #WhatAMistakeaToMakea


So then, about the XF and EastEnders ratings....

I agree, but Danny Dire doesn't.

I'm not saying it will happen, or even if the Strictly bosses have thought of it but they could quite easily manipulate this week to get Ed out if they wanted to.

The (insert dance here) 'athons' have always been generally used to help the judges favourites. Say they're ranked after the main dances:

6 points- Danny
5 points- Louise
5 points- Claudia
5 points- Ore
( All tied)
4 Points- Judge Rinder
3 points- Ed

In the Cha Cha:

Ed gets knocked out first leaving 4 points:

Then Judge Rinder gets knocked out = 6 Points

The Louise= 8 points Ed would then have to be 3rd or better in the public vote to beat Louise. It's not impossible, but its effective giving the judges 2/3 of the votes this week and I've never liked how they do it. Ed could get through, but it is stacked against him.

Hope BBC Two has a good alternative to that stupid let it go rubbish on BBC One.

If so, will 2016 be the first year when no episode of a soap has cleared 10 million in the officials?

Has ITV sent their Christmas press info out yet?

Still not heard anything from C5. I think C4 covered most of theirs in a press release.