BBC One’s The Night Manager continues to light up Sunday
Despite a deluge of live sports coverage on offer, the past weekend’s TV saw the usual suspects clamber their way to the top, with traditional favourites overshadowing the short-lived games.
On Saturday it was ITV’s turn to milk all the 2016 Six Nations Championship glory, with the penultimate day of the event kicking off with Ireland v Italy at 12:30pm on Saturday.
An average audience of 1.6 million viewers tuned in to see the boys in green irrelevantly trash their rivals, with the three hour coverage pulling in an 18% share.
Immediately afterwards at 3:30pm was the day’s big event, with England v Wales taking another three hour chunk out of ITV’s schedule.
5.1 million viewers watched the game that put England in position for ultimate glory, resulting in a 35% share, with some kind of controversial decisions made by the grand master referee helping the battle peak at 7.1 million viewers around 5:30pm.
Meanwhile, BBC One tactically prepared for the daytime ratings battle with the equally thrilling MOTD Live at 5:30pm, as Everton beat off Chelsea for a place in The FA Cup’s semi-final, resulting in 4.1 million viewers and a 23% share.
There was some proper silliness over on ITV at 7pm, with Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway once again helping viewers wash away the mental stains of the week with another hour and a half of celebrity cameos and audience participation.
The ultimate culmination of the entire history of lightweight weekend TV, Saturday’s live adventures in frivolous fun brought in 6 million viewers, a 29% share and the day’s biggest audience.
On BBC One at 7:30pm, the channel’s final series of the The Voice UK continued to trundle on despite treading well-trodden ground with hollow enthusiasm.
An audience of 5.3 million viewers tuned in for the latest live performance rounds (that part of the series that makes it virtually indistinguishable from any other talent show), resulting in a 25% share.
At 9:30pm, an audience of 4.7 million viewers tuned in to dependable weekend date, Casualty, with the long-running show about doctors and nurses that get sad and broody securing 4.7 million viewers and a 26% share.
Rugby was back on the agenda for Sunday afternoon with the Six Nations grand finale seeing Scotland face off against France, ultimately leading to England’s big victory. An average audience of 2.7 million viewers tuned in for the three hours, which kicked off at 2pm, resulting in a 24% share.
As expected (and completely unavoidable at this stage of its terrifying quest for complete and total dominance), cheerful and friendly magazine show Countryfile brought in the weekend’s biggest audience at 7pm.
The compilation episode, looking at all of those highly eager and ruddy-cheeked young farmers featured over the years, brought in 6.9 million viewers, with the next generation of amiable TV agricultural folk resulting in a 34% share.
Later at 8pm, Antiques Roadshow slithered into the Midwife-shaped hole in BBC One’s schedule with solid results. 5.9 million viewers watched as the ever professional Fiona Bruce went all urban and mustered some enthusiasm at being in North London’s Neasden, resulting in a 27% share.
Over on BBC Two, the second and final part of Steve Backshall’s Extreme Mountain Challenge (8pm) saw the daring adventurer dangle from a few more rocks in Venezuela, netting 1.7 million viewers and an 8% share.
For the fourth week in a row BBC One’s classy adaptation of John le Carré joint, The Night Manager, secured Sunday’s 9pm slot, with last night’s outing in espionage, weapons trafficking and Tom Hiddleston’s arse going into full-on sex-romp mode. An audience of 6 million viewers tuned in for scenes of corrupted flesh, taking to Twitter and securing a 27% share.
ITV’s period-drama-by-numbers Doctor Thorne continued its tale of class-restricted love, suffering an eye-catching -28% fall week on week.
Debuting with 3.4 million viewers last Sunday, the vapid tale of #aristocratproblems saw the second of three episodes bring in just 2.7 million viewers and a 12% share.
Over on Channel 4, humid kissing drama Indian Summers (9pm) returned for a second series, with the latest run promising more explosions and the beginning of an explosive revolution. 1.2 million viewers tuned in to see Julie Walters once again swan about like Lady Muck, securing a 6% share.
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. Overnight data supplied by TRP are based on 15 minute slot averages. This may differ from tape checked figures, which are based on a programme’s actual start and end time.
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