THE GAA’S championship broadcasts on RTÉ are holding up reasonably well in comparison to the World Cup, which is now in its second week.
The biggest audience of the past 11 days since the soccer began in South Africa was the Cork-Kerry Munster football replay in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, which drew a viewership of 564,000 last Sunday week, bettering the 503,000 who tuned in to England’s first match, against the USA on the previous evening.
Explaining the data, RTÉ Press and Publicity Officer Laura Fitzgerald cautioned that precise comparisons were difficult.
“The figures are average viewing figures for the actual match times and the share figure,” she said, “which is the percentage of people watching television at the time who tune in to the programme.
“It’s important to note that these figures are for matches at different times, different days and different channels and so would not be directly comparable. The World Cup takes place over a packed schedule of four weeks while the championship is weeks away from its climax.”
Perhaps surprisingly, of the two Ulster championship matches shown in the 5.15pm slot on Saturday evening, Cavan versus Fermanagh proved more popular than Down versus Tyrone although both matches were also shown on BBC 2 Northern Ireland.
SATURDAY, JUNE 13TH
South Korea-Greece 144,000 30%
Argentina-Nigeria 284,000 42%
England-USA 503,000 40%
Fermanagh-Cavan 230,000 29%
SUNDAY, JUNE 14TH
Algeria-Slovenia 150,000 22%
Serbia-Ghana 127,000 12%
Cork-Kerry 564,000 56%
SATURDAY JUNE 19TH
Cameroon-Denmark 286,000 28%
Tyrone-Down 200,000 28%
SUNDAY, JUNE 20TH
Sunday Game 205,000 19%
World Cup Round-Up 76,000 12%
