AFL grand final crowned the favourite TV program for 2016 as Seven won the year
Seven’s AFL grand final for 2016 was the most popular TV program last year, managing 3.201m to take Seven to a win with an overall audience share of 20.5%.
The Sydney versus Western Bulldogs final – where the underdogs (the Bulldogs) took home the trophy – pulled 3.081m for the game and 3.201m for the post-game presentations, according to OzTAM’s consolidated metro figures.
The Melbourne audience was the highest for the sports program as 1.623m tuned in compared with 460,000 in Sydney. The post-match for the grand final averaged 2.342m viewers, with 1.294m of those viewers being in Melbourne.
In a sports-heavy top 20 programs of the year, Nine’s Rugby League grand final came in third spot achieving 2.670m in front of the State of Origin Rugby League opening match, which averaged 2.663m.
The first non-sports program to appear in the list was Seven’s Molly: Part 1, the mini-series about Molly Meldrum, which pulled 2.216m just ahead of Nine’s The Block winner announcement episode, which managed 2.210m. The Block’s complete grand final episode pulled 1.870m viewers.
Reality cooking TV show My Kitchen Rules made the top 20 at number 10 with its winner announcement managing 2.096m, beating Ten’s cooking show Masterchef winner announcement which averaged 1.999m. The rest of the grand final for MKR saw 1.925m tune in topping Ten’s 1.785m for the whole Masterchef final.
Seven’s Melbourne Cup coverage managed 2.069m for the big race, beating the presentation which pulled 1.639m and the 2016 Men’s Australian Open final which averaged 1.634m.
The competitive year of television put Nine in second place with 18.3% and Ten in third position with 13.6%. ABC came close to Ten for the year, finishing with 12.5% and clearly beating SBS’ 4.8%.
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