Television Viewing Round-Up: June 2010

June viewing was dominated by the FIFA World Cup, which kicked-off on Friday 11 with a spectacular opening ceremony showcasing the best of host nation South Africa.

All Viewing

Games came thick and fast during the group stage of the tournament, with ITV1’s coverage of the opening ceremony – and Republic of South Africa v Mexico match – picking up a peak of 9.4 million viewers, a 16.4% share of the audience.

Of course, the big viewing figures were for the England matches, with our plucky lads’ first performance drawing an audience average of 12.3 million viewers (a 50.2% share), peaking at 21.6 million (37.9%).

On ITV1 on Saturday 12 June, England took on a well-drilled USA team and managed to pick up a 1-1 draw in an utterly uninspired showing, only enlivened by goalkeeper Rob Green’s awful error.

The big talking point from the game was not the total lack of quality on the pitch, however, but rather the 1.2 million viewers watching on ITV1 HD who missed England’s 4th minute goal.

A “human error” meant a car advert was inadvertently played just as Steven Gerrard slipped the ball past USA goalkeeper Tim Howard, prompting the broadcaster to offer an unreserved apology to those affected.

England’s second match, on ITV1 on Friday 18 June, was against those titans of the international game, Algeria.

Unfortunately, ITV was unable to show an ad across the entire match, so viewers were forced to put up with 90 minutes of soporific ‘action’, which finally ended 0-0.

The ITV1 coverage had an average of 13.2 million viewers (51.8%) and peaked at 22.8 million (40%), with ITV1 HD grabbing 1.4 million (5.7%).

And so to the final group game, a must-win fixture for our beleaguered band of millionaires.

This one, broadcast on BBC One, was another tough match, with Slovenia’s finest battling to stop our progress to the second round.

Despite its 3pm kick-off, a fair few people managed to get to their TV sets, with an average of almost 11.5 million viewers (71.7%) tuning in, peaking at 15.7 million (27.6%).

England ground out a stodgy 1-0 win, although they eventually finished group runners-up to the USA, pitting them against Germany in the second round.

They probably shouldn’t have bothered. England took to the pitch at Bloemfontein and were outclassed 4-1 by a German team brimming with youthful zest.

Shown on BBC One on Sunday 27 June, it had an audience average of 15.8 million viewers (a massive 73.4% share), peaking at 19.5 million (34.2%). BBC HD coverage picked up an audience average of 1.6 million viewers (7.6%).

Overall figures for the month show that ITV1’s share of viewing was up 2.1 percentage points year on year to 18.3% in all homes, while BBC One remained relatively static at 21.4%.

Away from the football, BBC One’s soap stalwart EastEnders had a good month, pulling in decent audiences when going head to head with the beautiful game.

BBC Two and Channel 4 were down 0.9 percentage points and 1 percentage point respectively. BBC Two now has a 6.8% share in all homes, while Channel 4’s stands at 5.9%.

The beginning of the month was notable for the start of the final series of Big Brother on Channel 4, with the launch night show grabbing an audience of 4.6 million (a 19.7% share).

Five recorded a 0.7 percentage point fall, to 4.4%.

Digital Viewing

In digital homes, BBC One saw its viewing share grow 0.8 percentage points year on year, to 20.9%, while ITV1 was up 2.8 percentage points to 18%.

BBC Two fell 0.5 percentage points to 6.5%, Channel 4 was down 0.7 percentage points to 5.8% and Five fell 0.6 percentage points to 4.3%.

Sky and Freeview Homes

BBC One had a 24.5% share of viewing in Freeview homes and an 18.5% share in Sky homes, while ITV1 had an 20.2% share in Freeview homes and a 16% share in Sky homes.