Football final still the biggest draw

SPORT ON TV: The All-Ireland football final continues to attract the highest television audience of any sporting event here.

Figures released by RTÉ yesterday confirmed last September's meeting between Tyrone and Kerry as the most popular sporting programme on Irish television for 2005, comfortably holding its number one rank from the previous year.

Ireland's World Cup qualifying campaign had a significant effect on the 2005 viewing, but GAA events still hold down four of the top 10. Ireland's crucial World Cup qualifier against Switzerland was the second most watched event of the year, just edging out the All-Ireland hurling final between Cork and Galway.

Significantly, the viewing figures represent all channels available to Irish viewers, including satellite channels, which confirms the so-called terrestrial events do still dominate. All 10 of the leading sporting events were transmitted by RTÉ Two.

The figures, which were produced by AGB Nielson, were then ranked by TV rating, which effectively is the share of the available population. The Tyrone-Kerry match on September 25th attracted a rating of 23.2 per cent, which also represented 73.2 per cent share of people watching television at the time, and an estimated audience of 887,000.

The Ireland-Switzerland World Cup qualifier on October 12th got a 20.1 rating, but only attracted 50 per pent of people watching television at the time. The All-Ireland hurling final, which got a 19 per cent rating, in fact attracted the largest share of people watching television at that time (73.5 per cent). That represented an estimated audience of 726,000.

World Cup qualifying matches filled the fourth through seventh rankings, including both qualifiers against Israel, and led by the visit of France to Lansdowne Road back on September 7th. Only one Six Nations rugby match, Ireland v England at Lansdowne Road, made the list at number eight, attracting a rating of 14.7 per cent and a viewing share of 54.8 per cent (551,000).

Two All-Ireland semi-finals complete the list. The football semi-final between Tyrone and Armagh on September 4th was ranked number nine, attracting 60 per cent of the viewers at the time, or an estimated 551,000. The hurling semi-final between Kilkenny and Galway on August 21st completed the list, with 52.9 per cent of the viewers, or 492,000.

The only surprise is that none of Dublin's championship matches, especially their quarter-final replay against Tyrone, managed to make the top 10.

Ireland's failure to qualify for the World Cup in Germany means GAA matches are set to dominate the 2006 figures, with the only challenge likely to come from the Ryder Cup, regardless of whether that makes terrestrial television.