Today show ratings woes continue with Karl Stefanovic in the hosting chair
The Today show is heading into its second week of coverage from the Australian Open but ratings for Karl Stefanovic and Allison Langdon is lower than last year when Georgie Gardner and Deb Knight hosted Nine’s Today show live.
Confidential
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As Nine’s beleaguered Today show goes into its second week of coverage from the Australian Open, ratings figures show the new look line-up of Karl Stefanovic and Allison Langdon is yet to make its mark.
In fact, figures are down on last year when Georgie Gardner and Deb Knight hosted Nine’s Today show live from the Australian Open.
The Stefanovic and Langdon led show scored a national five city metro market audience of just 199,000 people compared to rival Seven Sunrise with its 271,000.
Last year, Gardner and Knight attracted 211,000 viewers in the five metro city markets for the first week of the Australian Open.
“Executives would be going, ‘Oh my god, we thought this was going to be hard but we are not getting an early bounce’,” leading media analyst Steve Allen told Confidential.
“We have been consistently saying that this will take time. Karl reappearing on screen isn’t going to mean all of the people that left the show have suddenly forgiven him. It will take time and he will need to keep his act clean and need to stay out of the headlines on anything about his personal life and his relationship with others inside the network.”
So far this year headlines have very much focused on Stefanovic’s personal life with the TV presenter hosting a gender reveal party in Melbourne on Friday night where he and wife Jasmine announced she is pregnant with a baby girl.
The Australian television ratings don’t start until next month with both Seven and Nine teams on deck early throughout January in a bid to get a strong start to the year.
The new look Today team sees Stefanovic and Langdon supported by newsreader Tracey Vo, weather presenter Tim Davies, sports journalist Alex Cullen and entertainment reporter Brooke Boney.
“While the ratings grew during the week for the tennis at night, there was no similar bounce for the breakfast show, which is stuck firmly below 200,000,” another media analyst, who did not want to be named, said. “Executives would be disappointed but not yet pressing the panic button as they know it will absolutely take time to bed everything down.”
Stefanovic made his return to Today on January 4, the first show attracting an audience of 231,000 in metro markets compared to 312,000 on Sunrise.
Stefanovic and Langdon dropped to 183,000 viewers last Monday, compared to Sunrise at 267,000 in the metro markets.
The national five city average for 2019, with Gardner and Knight hosting, was 195,000. The lowest figure for Today last year was 155,000, which prompted executives to bring Stefanovic back and take a broom to the rest of the office.
