Another big weekend in sport has gone by with men’s and women’s state of Origin, International League, and Men’s cricket and Women’s football World Cups still going, while Super Netball hits another audience record, Super Rugby enters its finals and the AFL finally ends its bye rounds.
NRL
More than 4.5 million people watched matches across the representative weekend, headlined by Origin game 2 which had 2.799 million viewers on Sunday night. Total Rugby league ratings for the season have now reached 58.9 million for the season.
Game 2 of State of Origin is the 2nd highest rating program on tv in 2019 behind Origin 1. Nine reports that Ave Live streaming VPM was up 93% on Game 2 in 2018.
Women’s origin on Friday night rated 783,000 on Nine and Fox, and the women’s league test between Samoa and New Zealand rated 39,000 on Fox.
314,000 people tuned in to New Zealand v Tonga on GEM metro and Fox, while 259,000 switched on for Fiji v Lebanon – regionals were not available for these matches. Saturday nights Samoa v PNG had 355,000 viewers on Nine/GEM nationally and Fox.
AFL
Round 14 of the 2019 AFL season was watched by 3.536 million viewers across the Seven network and Foxfooty. Total ratings across the season have no reached over 57.8 million.
The highest rating game of the round was Friday nights Swans v Hawks game which topped 1.003 million viewers, it was also the highest game of the round on the Seven network with 794,000 viewers.
The highest game of the round on Fox Footy was Sundays Western Bulldogs v Collingwood game which reeled in 264,000.
So far this season, the AFL rates 260,000 on metro tv – although Melbourne rates 277,000 viewers per game. The league rates an average of 349,000 on free to air television, and 176,000 on Fox, with a season total average per game of 495,000.
Saturdays WAFL game between East Fremantle and West Coast rated 53,000, while in the SANFL Norwood v Wooldville-West Torrens rated 21,000. On Sunday, the SANFL game between Glenelg and Central District rated 23,000 and in the VFL, Port Melbourne v Essendon rated 46,000.
World Cup Cricket
The first session of Tuesday night’s World Cup cricket match between Australia and England had a national average audience of 709k on 9GEM (Metro: 507k / Regional: 203k). Plus an additional 360k nationally via Fox Cricket
On Friday England v Sri Lanka rated 83,000 on Fox Cricket while India v Afghanistan rated 74,000 for session 1 and 37,000 for session 2 on Saturday. Pakistan v South Africa rated 66,000 for session 1 on Sunday.
Women’s World Cup
The Women’s World Cup match between Australia and Norway averaged 166,000 metro viewers on SBS during regular time. As the match went into overtime and then a penalty shootout the audience grew to 270,000.
Super Netball
Thunderbirds v Swifts drew the highest metro audience for the season with 106,000 people watching in the 5 capitals. Saturdays Lightning v Fever match up had 86,000. Metro ratings for Super Netball this season average 88,000 per game with Saturday fixtures averaging 84,000 and Sunday’s rating 94,000 respectively.
Super Rugby
Only one Australian side featured in the finals with the Brumbies v Sharks having 86,000 viewers on Saturday night, as well as 12,000 on Sunday for the replay.
Saturdays Shute Shield clash between Warringah and Easts had 20,000 viewers on 7TWO.
Motorsport
The French Grand Prix on the weekend rated 89,000 on Fox for qualifying, while the race itself pulled in 95,000 viewers on Sunday.
Jason Lassey is a sports industry blogger focussed on the Attendances, Financials and TV Ratings of professional sport in Australia. A long time Carlton supporter, he longs for the heady days of 1995 to come around once more.
Twitter – @footyindustryAU
Website – http://www.footyindustry.com/