First Test between Australia and Sri Lanka averages 445,333 metro viewers for Seven
The first day/night Test match between Australia and Sri Lanka managed an average of 445,333 metro viewers, new figures show.
According to OzTAM’s overnight preliminary ratings, the highest audience for the Test, which ran on Seven, was session three’s 596,000 metro viewers, while session two pulled 439,000 and session one managed just 301,000.
That's dinner! Australia's session once again as Sri Lanka go to the main break on day one at 8-122: https://t.co/ldLZkL1yYC #AUSvSL pic.twitter.com/X4zpluwU92
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) January 24, 2019
Nationally, sessions one, two and three captured 439,000, 623,000 and 859,000.
Later on in the evening, Seven’s Big Bash match between the Perth Scorchers and the Sydney Thunder averaged 490,000 for session one and 439,000 for session two.
However the cricket was not nearly as popular as Nine’s Australian Open last night, which averaged 831,000 metro viewers for the evening. The three-set match between Stefanos Tsitsipas and Rafael Nadal had an average of 1.014 metro viewers. Nadal and Tsitsipas’ match appeared popular across all demographics, as Nine’s Australian Open coverage took out the 16-39s, 18-49s and 25-54s.
The match between Naomi Osaka and Karolina Pliskova, which commenced in the late afternoon, pulled a metro audience of 593,000. Nine’s total viewer average for the night session was 1.102m.
Ten’s I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here, also pulled a larger audience than the cricket, with an average of 680,000 metro viewers, and 968,000 nationally.
Overall, Seven News won the night with a metro audience of 923,000. Nine News, while more popular in Melbourne, averaged 814,000 across the five metro cities. The most watched program of the night for the ABC was 621,000.
The Australian Open helped Nine to another audience win, with a 23.9% share. The closest competitor for Thursday evening was Seven, with a 20.9% share, followed by Ten’s 12.3%. ABC and SBS had shares of 8.9% and 3.7%.
When adding in Nine’s multi-channels, its network share grew to 32.5%, beating Seven Network’s 30.7%.
