The last time Big Brother was on at Saturday night it got 2.65m, so its only slightly down - which is pretty good considering its not been on a Saturday for nearly 2 years.

True. Also figure in the C4+1 figure, and it would have possibly been higher than 2.65m.

Surely it was asking for trouble to put 2 hours of F1 qualifying on ITV1 prime-time, considering:

1) More than half the programme was chat
2) More importantly there was sport on BBC1 at the same time and more sports fans would go for the football.

Also with sport on BBC1, ITV1 would have had no competition for a dose of "general ITV1 Saturday night entertainment".

There was also no need for the football on ITV1 to have a 30 minute introduction. It's 15 minutes on all nights when there is football on weekdays. So ITV1 could have had "general ITV1 Saturday night entertainment" from 5.15pm to 7.30pm and this would have done far better.

I also think the figures for Euro 2008 on both channnels look pretty poor. Without England involved, the whole event will not capture the imagination like it normally does. Also with the huge growth of football coverage over the last few years (with many more people having Sky/Setanta) I suspect many of these people may be ready to take a break from football for the summer without England being there to get them into it.

Casualty has picked up from last weeks (unconfirmed) all time low. Nice to see Doctor Who picking up again. ITV inevitably struggle without BGT, but luckily for them only two months till TXF.

not good for BB i see...

The BB saturday highlights show has never rated that well, hence they've not done it for the last 2 years. That figure is fine for saturday methinks.

And that would leave F1 fans unhappy having their programme bumped to ITV2/3/4 to have some shitty "Animals Do The Funniest Things" crap in their place.

I am glad Dr Who found its feet again-the two parter was up there with the best stories and deserved more if there was any justice.
As far as the football is concerned-doesnt bode well really-Portugal and Ronaldo I would have thought will be one of the biggest draws and 4 million in primetime isnt much to write home about. Quite a come down from ITV1's rare heights last week.
The BBC's performance is consistent and will no doubt be back winning weekly shares again until......Im a Celebrity maybe.

I don't think the ratings will match those of the World Cup as there is so much less hype and build up surrounding the tournament and there won't be the same number of casual viewers tuning in. That said, I still think the big matches will pull in perfectly respectable ratings and its the kind of thing which may well build momentum as people learn more about the other teams as the tournament unfolds. The other thing is I reckon there will be a much bigger difference between big matches and matches with relative minnows than we saw in the World Cup. People won't sit down to watch any old game like they did two years ago, but a match between to top notch teams will still see good figures.

I know what you mean with Doctor Who - its ratings seem to bounce around a lot, often with little in the way of an explanation - but the averages usually work out well and it seems as popular now as it has ever been.

A touch defensive.

Is it gonna be like this all summer, with biased fans making any old excuse for its poor ratings?

I'm quite enjoying this series but I have to be honest and admit that 2.4m is far from great considering it was only the second highlights show of the series.

Still enough to make it the highest rated programme on C4 on a Saturday for quite a long time though.

Remember that the overall ratings figure isn't all that is important

Upmarket young men will have tuned in last night, the people that advertisers love and the people that wouldn't usually tune in for Mr and Mrs

Yes, I think it was very good business for ITV1 last night - a good quality of audience. A nice change to usual programming.

and good promotion for the F1 tonight so it should average 5m at least and peak over 7m

It's not defensive, its just true.

Saturdays have always been really unpopular - thats why it got axed.

Yes, the F1 certainly needed some exposure in my opinion. I think ITV should make the most of it as it will be going to the BBC next season.

On Page 500, I was thinking we could have a remembrance of the first 500 pages of the ratings thread, with a few comments on how the ratings have changed, and we could have a little vote for our favourite posters on the thread - and make a few predictions on how the ratings will change until we meet Page 1000.

How about that?

F1 will be low, with Hamilton and Raikonnen going out early.

I suppose looking at BB Saturday ratings - its great that it got that many viewers on a saturday - i mean usually not even a million people watch ch4 on saturdays....

I agree.


Not everyone are Hamilton fans (besides; he made a stupid mistake today!).

Besides, a British driver did finish third (Coulthard).

I'm not a fan. I used to be but I loathed last summers series to the extent I have no real interest in it anymore.

BB got 3.6m

That's alright actually. It looks quite good this year, compared to last year's shitness.

And the competition was not great, a repeat of Taggart and the Euro coverage was extremely unappealing to women - they obviously flocked to Channel 4.

A touch hypocritical as thats what people seem to do day after day with NaT's ratings, had a lead in of 13m but averaged 2m because it started 1 min late.

Wasnt Robbie Sykes made public enemy no.1 for saying a similar thing about the constant justification of NaT's ratings only yours is put in an even more blunt demeanour. The principle still stands.

For your information Saturday's highlights averaged 2.910m and the average thus far is 3.8m well up on last year.

13m and 2m. This is so so untrue.

News at Ten is not the sort of programme that relies on a lead-in anyway. The programme earned about 1.5 million more viewers when BGT was on so hopefully those viewers will come back to the news programme.

My mistake 10m-2m. I wonder how its AI's stand.