The tenth week of the Premier League season brought mostly declines on the NBC family of networks.
Last Sunday’s Southampton/Chelsea English Premier League match had a 0.5 final rating and 817,000 viewers on NBC, down a tick in ratings but up 2% in viewership from Liverpool/Southampton last year (0.6, 799K). There was no comparable window in 2014.
In a fairly soft year for the Premier League, Chelsea’s win delivered the third-largest audience of the season — trailing Manchester United/Hull City in week three (1.2M) and Liverpool/West Brom in week nine (851K).
In NBC’s usual Saturday afternoon Premier League window, Crystal Palace/Liverpool had a 0.5 and 769,000 — down 38% in ratings and a third in viewership from Arsenal/Everton last year (0.8, 1.2M). Again, there was no comparable window in 2014.
On cable, Manchester United/Burnley was the week’s top draw with 392,000 viewers last Saturday morning. That trailed last year’s West Ham/Chelsea game by 27% (536K) and Queens Park/Chelsea in 2014 by a third (583K). All three matches had the same 0.3 rating.
The concurrent Tottenham/Leicester City match on CNBC had a 0.1 and 179,000, flat in ratings and down 5% in viewership from Leicester City/Crystal Palace on USA last year (0.1, 188K). Rounding out the Saturday slate, Sunderland/Arsenal had a 0.2 and 276,000 earlier in the morning — down a tick and 30%, respectively, from Liverpool/Newcastle in ’14 (0.3, 395K). There was no comparable window last year.
Wrapping up a mostly down week, Everton/West Ham had a 0.2 (-60%) and 343,000 (-55%) Sunday morning. Keep in mind last year’s comparable window was the Manchester Derby (0.5, 769K). Stoke City/Swansea had 170,000 on Monday, off 2% from Crystal Palace/Sunderland in ’14 (173K). There was no year-ago window.
Through ten weeks, 35 of the 49 Premier League windows that can be compared to last year have declined.
(Wknd. numbers via ShowBuzz Daily 11/1, Sports TV Ratings 11/1)
