Summer Sport officially took over on the weekend, with an A-league Season launch and the NBL entering its second week.
The Netball Constellation Cup and the Rugby Union World Cup continued. But the weekend was dominated by the Supercars at Bathurst.
Sundays Bathurst race was the most-watched sporting event on both Foxtel and free to air television over the weekend with more than 1.8 million viewers.
As always, the figures do not include Kayo, other streaming services, or Mobile devices, unless specified. All data is sourced from Oztam.
Bathurst
The V8s at Bathurst had a huge weekend – on Sunday, 818.000 watched the race on Ten in the five cities (up 11% on last year), with 561,000 watching in the regions.
A massive 469,000 also watched on Foxtel.
sOn Saturday more than a 1,000,000 people tuned in nationally for the Shootout programming on both Fox and Ten, while on Friday more than 400,000 switched on for qualifying.
Rugby Union World Cup
Nearly 600,000 people tuned into Foxtel and Ten on Friday night to see the world cup match between Australia and Georgia in Japan, including 416,000 on Free to air television, and 171,000 on Foxtel.
Japan v Scotland was watched by 133,000 while Wales and Uruguay had 89,000 people switch over.
Football
The A-league had a lacklustre launch in its first week, with its new ABC partner rating 47,000 in the five cities for Saturday evenings Wanderers v Mariners clash at Bankwest. While this was down on last season’s opener – a Saturday night Melbourne Derby which rated 93,000 in the five cities on One – it is still well ahead of the closing weeks on the commercial broadcaster, which only managed a 34,000 average viewership in its final days.
On Foxtel, Saturday nights Melbourne derby was the highest rating match of the round with 60,000 tuning in, while the opening game between Adelaide and Sydney FC rated 52,000.
On Tuesday night the Socceroos v Chinese Taipei was watched by 36,000 on Foxtel.
Basketball
The NBLs inaugural SBS season continued with the weekends matches rating 19,000 on Saturday and 14,000 on Sunday. The metro broadcast average for this season 22,000 – down only slightly from the 22,000 averaged in the last few weeks of the previous season on 9Go!
Foxtel figures for ESPN’s NBL coverage on Friday night and Monday night are unavailable and no data was available for the WNBL.
Netball
The Constellation Cup between Australia and New Zealand started on Sunday, with 66,000 viewers in the metro cities on Nine. There are three more matches to come.
Motorsport
The Japanese Grand Prix rated 110,000 on Foxtel
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/