ITV Sees Record Ratings For Champions League Win
ITV1 saw massive audiences with its screening of the UEFA Champion’s League Final last night, drawing a peak of 14.6 million sports fans to the match, which saw Liverpool clinch a dramatic victory over Milan in a nail-biting penalty shoot out.
The peak audience represented a 60% share for ITV, while the programme’s average audience hit 10.8 million viewers to secure a 46% share, although this included an extra time period of thirty minutes.
A massive 57% of all males watching TV tuned in to the high-profile match, with ITV forced to clear its schedule as the non-stop action kept viewers hooked until 11pm. The four-hour programme, hosted by Gabby Logan and including the pre-match build-up and post-match analysis, was watched by an average of 9.7 million and a 44% share.
Commenting on the ratings high, ITV’s controller of sport, Mark Sharman, said: “We’re absolutely delighted with both the result for Liverpool FC and the television ratings. The Champions League is the world’s top club competition and ITV is delighted to have brought last night’s drama to almost 15 million viewers.”
The ratings win sees ITV trump the BBC’s FA Cup Final last Saturday, which drew an average of 6.5 million viewers across its total coverage, and an average of 8.8 million for the match itself. The game secured a peak of 12.8 million as the match went to a nail-biting penalty shoot out between Arsenal and Manchester United, but was still some way behind ITV’s figures for last night’s game.
ITV1’s coverage brought the highest audiences of the year to a football match and, given the footballing schedule for the rest of the year, this looks likely to stand for 2005.
Speaking at ITV’s Annual General Meeting today, Charles Allen, chief executive of the broadcaster, was upbeat, despite the recent downturn in the broadcaster’s viewing share, highlighting ITV1’s success in peak time, stating that it had broadcast the top 370 commercial programmes in 2005 so far.
“Our success in growing our audiences is the result of planning and scheduling our new channels and leveraging the resources of our unparalleled production business and programme library,” he said. “We will continue this work and will launch another new channel, ITV4, later in the year aimed at a male demographic.”
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