DUBLIN NOT only bridged a 72-year gap in their hurling history by winning the Allianz Hurling League title last Sunday but they also made television history by drawing the largest ever audience to TG4.
The Irish language station has exclusive rights to all Sunday games in the Allianz Leagues, including finals – and last Sunday’s decider in Croke Park between Dublin and Kilkenny peaked at a record 430,000 viewers, just after 5.30pm, as Dublin pulled convincingly clear of their favoured opponents to land a first such league title since 1939.
This represents the highest audience rating ever for the channel, even surpassing the Division One football final between Dublin and Cork the previous Sunday. The official Nielsen television audience measure gave the peak at 430,000 viewers, while an average of 310,000 viewers watched the entire hurling match.
These are significant figures, especially given the game on Sunday also drew a high attendance of 42,030 – almost three times more than the 14,200 that attended last year’s hurling final in Thurles.
The curtain-raiser of the All-Ireland Under-21 football between Galway and Cavan is thought to have contributed as much as one third of that crowd, although still the Dublin support was impressive, particularly at the Hill 16 end.
Last week, TG4 announced an average of 307,000 tuned into their live coverage of the Division One football final. Only 36,438 showed up at GAA HQ that day, as Cork beat Dublin and Donegal overcame Laois in the Division One and Two finals. The GAA had hoped the presence of the Dublin footballers in a national final would attract over 50,000 spectators.
As with the previous week, TG4 was comfortably the most popular channel in the country on Sunday afternoon last, with one in three people viewing television in Ireland on Sunday afternoon watching TG4. This gave it a share four times higher than any other channel for that period and the television audience for the hurling match delivered an overall reach of 620,000 viewers for TG4. The Nielsen system also only measures domestic viewership and does not include those watching in pubs, clubs, etc.
Meanwhile, the GAA have announced the schedule of live football championships matches to be broadcast this summer, beginning on Sunday week with the first round of the Ulster championship clash between Donegal and Antrim in Ballybofey. The following week sees a double header of Leinster football championship action as Kildare play Wicklow and Laois take on Longford.
RTÉ’s traditional grip on live GAA championship broadcasts has been loosened this season as both TV3 and Newstalk radio gained new rights for the next three seasons, as agreed last November. TV3’s coverage will now extend to the All-Ireland senior quarter-finals and both minor All-Ireland finals – while Newstalk finally gets to break into live national GAA broadcasting with a choice of “second” championship matches.
The new three-year broadcast packages were announced by Croke Park last November, covering the championship broadcast rights from 2011 to 2013. The number of senior championship matches tendered for television broadcast was reduced from 50 matches annually to 40, although this is not expected to impact heavily on the television audiences as the fixtures dropped are taken primarily from the early part of the season.
Overall RTÉ will broadcast 31 senior championship games and TV3 will cover nine. While RTÉ still get the headline games in terms of the senior All-Ireland semi-finals and finals in both football and hurling, TV3 won what is known as “package two” – or the second best of five championship packages.
This means TV3 will be showing this summer’s Ulster and Connacht football finals as part of the package of nine games (two All-Ireland football quarter-finals, two qualifiers, three provincial finals, two other provincial fixtures – plus the two All-Ireland minor finals.
Between July 23rd and July 31st the All-Ireland football qualifiers round four and the All-Ireland football quarter-finals will take place, although it has to be confirmed what broadcaster will be covering these games.
The championship hurling games to be covered live this summer will be confirmed next week, at the official launch of the hurling championship, while RTÉ will next week unveil The Sunday Game's two new panellists and the new presenter of RTÉ's new mid-week GAA series on RTÉ2.
All games are broadcast by RTÉ unless otherwise stated.
2011 FOOTBALL CHAMPIONSHIP ON TV:
May 15th– Ulster Senior Championship, Donegal v Antrim Mac Cumhaill Park, Ballybofey; May 22nd– Leinster Senior Championship, Kildare v Wicklow, O'Moore Park, Portlaoise, Laois v Longford, O'Moore Park, Portlaoise; May 28th– Ulster Senior Championship, Armagh v Down, Athletic Grounds, Armagh; June 4th– Munster Senior Championship, Semi-Final, Limerick v Kerry/Tipperary, Páirc na nGael, Limerick; June 5th– Leinster Senior Championship, Kildare/Wicklow v Meath, Croke Park; Laois/Longford v Dublin, Croke Park (TV3); June 12th– Connacht Senior Championship, Semi-Final, Sligo/Leitrim v Roscommon, Markievicz Park/Páirc Seán Mac Diarmada; June 19th– Ulster Senior Championship, Semi-Final, Derry/Fermanagh v Armagh/Down; June 26th– Leinster Senior Championship, Semi-Final, Kildare/Wicklow/Meath v Laois/Longford/Dublin, Croke Park; Connacht Senior Championship, Semi-Final, Mayo/London v Galway, McHale Park, Castlebar; July 3rd– Munster Senior Championship Final; July 10th– Leinster Senior Championship Final, Croke Park; July 17th– Ulster Senior Championship Final (TV3), Connacht Senior Championship Final (TV3); August 21st– All-Ireland Senior Championship Semi-Final; August 28th– All-Ireland Senior Championship Semi-Final; September 18th– All-Ireland Senior Championship Final.
