Ratings, attendance bounce after AFL stacks its early fixture

The AFL has reaped massive attendance numbers and a series of games drawing a million TV viewers after a fixture reshuffle that has shunned Carlton from prime time.

The AFL has bounced back from its disastrous Carlton-heavy 2018 fixture with bumper ratings and attendances in its marquee early schedule.

The league stacked the first six weeks of the season with blockbuster clashes after a 12 per cent drop in ratings amid unattractive football last year.

It has been vindicated by six straight weekends with 300,000 fans attending games for a total of 2,101,633 attendees — up from last year’s 2,092,375.

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TV ratings for prime time Thursday and Friday nights are also up ten per cent after six weeks.

There have already been five games of over 70,000 patrons, headed by the 92,241 fans at Anzac Day, the sixth-highest home-and-away attendance ever.

Every Thursday or Friday night game except for last Friday’s one-sided Port Adelaide win over North Melbourne has drawn one million TV viewers across Seven and Fox Footy combined.

Fans are tuning in to Thursday night footy. Pic: Michael Klein

AFL fixturing boss Travis Auld told the Herald Sun yesterday despite the ratings he felt eight Thursday night games each year was about the right number.

“The first five rounds leading into Anzac Day, having five Thursday nights in a row is something new we were able to introduce with five days breaks and that strategy worked quite well with attendance and TV audiences,” he said.

“The average audience for Thursday nights and Friday night have both been over a million, both of which are about ten per cent up. Ten per cent is a significant number in terms of television ratings.

“The obvious response to Thursday nights is why don’t we have more of them?

“It feels right if you ask me six rounds in. Come the end of the year we will do a proper assessment. It might move by one or two but I don’t see it changing substantially.”

The Bombers are more regular prime time features in 2019. Pic: AAP

Essendon and North Melbourne made every post a winner except on-field with Good Friday and would seem likely for next year, with two games again likely to be schedule.

Last year with Carlton scheduled in a host of Friday night fixtures the two-win Blues were a flop and ratings plummeted accordingly in a series of one-sided games.

This year Collingwood has been involved in three of the five top-attended games, including Anzac Day, Round 1 against Geelong (78,017) and Round 2 against Richmond (70,699).

With Essendon, Collingwood and Richmond all in strong form and Carlton showing signs of life the league will be hopeful of continued strong attendances all year.

The outlier is Melbourne, who at 1-5 have a suite of prime time fixtures to come and the league hoping they will quickly turn around their form.

Brodie Grundy and the Magpies have featured in three of the five most-attended matches of 2019. Pic: AAP

BIGGEST CROWDS SO FAR IN 2019

92,241 — Round 6 Anzac Day Essendon v Collingwood, MCG (6th highest home and away attendance ever)

85,016 — Round 1

Carlton v Richmond, MCG

78,017 — Round 1 Collingwood v Geelong, MCG

72,774 — Round 6

Richmond v Melbourne, MCG

70,699 — Round 2

Richmond v Collingwood, MCG

Originally published as Ratings, attendance bounce after AFL stacks its early fixture