Hustle’s return draws in 5.9 million

The return of BBC One’s popular crime drama Hustle, which also featured Adrian Lester’s come-back as Mickey, pulled in more than 5.9 million peak viewers last night.

Around 5.7 million average viewers tuned in to see the group scam a group of London property developers, securing BBC One with a 23.3% audience share between 9pm and 10pm.

However, BBC One’s run of new programmes from 8pm, starting with Caroline Quentin’s Life of Riley, failed to compete with ITV1 – The Bill banked the peak audience between 8pm and 9pm with 5.4 million average viewers and a 22.2% audience share.

Total Emergency, ITV1’s new emergency services show, lost a number of viewers at 9pm though, slipping to 3.8 million average viewers and a 15.6% audience share.

Meanwhile, BBC Two also aired a new programme between 9pm and 10pm – a documentary called Victoria Farm – which attracted 2.8 million average viewers compared with Channel 4’s Celebrity Big Brother 2.7 million viewers.

Overnight data is available each morning in mediatel.co.uk’s TV Database, with all BARB registered subscribers able to view reports for terrestrial networks and key multi-channel stations.

BBC: 020 8743 8000 www.bbc.co.uk ITV: 020 7843 8000 www.itv.com Channel Four: 020 7396 4444 www.channel4.com