Media Street: Who’s really winning footy’s TV war?

It’s nearing half-time in the footy TV wars and bragging rights well and truly belong to one side. SCOTT GULLAN investigates the numbers in Footy Classified’s battle with The Agenda Setters.

It’s nearing half-time in the TV wars and the bragging rights are currently with the old faithful Footy Classified but the new kid on the block, The Agenda Setters, is warming into its work.

After 10 weeks of going head-to-head on Monday and Tuesday nights, an analysis of the ratings has Ch 9’s Footy Classified out in front of the much-hyped new Ch 7 show.

But there has been a clear improvement as the season has evolved by The Agenda Setters who sensationally poached three members of the Footy Classified panel – Craig Hutchison, Kane Cornes and Caroline Wilson – over the summer.

Channel 7 came out swinging with a new Monday night show, The Agenda Setters.

The problem with ratings is there are so many variables and measurements with both networks able to spin them to suit their own purposes.

According to Ch 9, the Victorian figures for the head-to-head battle show Agenda Setters have only won three time slots for the season when using the Total People Average Audience measurement.

Over at Seven, they point out that last week’s Monday and Tuesday episodes had a combined Total TV audience nationally of 187,000 which was the second strongest week to date.

And that over the past four weeks the Tuesday episode of The Agenda Setters – which is hosted by Cornes and includes Wilson, Luke Hodge and Dale Thomas – has consistently attracted a higher Total TV Average Audience nationally than Footy Classified.

But the Monday episode of Footy Classified, which has been the network’s flagship footy show since 2007, has consistently rated big figures with its new line-up of Sam McClure as host, Jimmy Bartel, Matthew Lloyd and Damian Barrett.

This week in Melbourne it rated 81,600 to Agenda Setters 58,300 with Tuesday’s Footy Classified, which is hosted by Eddie McGuire with new panellist former Essendon champion James Hird, winning 79,200 to 60,700.

Seven knew they had a big fight on their hands despite the impressive off-season recruiting and are taking a multimedia business view of the opening couple of months with the Agenda Setters having excellent “social traction” on X, Instagram and Facebook.

Jimmy Bartel, Matthew Lloyd, Sam McClure and Damian Barrett – the Footy Classified 2025 team. Picture: Ch9/Supplied

Tuesday night’s exclusive about Umpire-Gate which exposed the AFL’s cover-up of the Lachie Shultz incident was a perfect example. Clips from the show had 1.9 million views with 570,000 views on Instagram, 415,000 on Facebook, 600,000 on X and 309000 on TikTok.

There is no doubt a halo-effect coming off the back of the ratings juggernaut Married At First Sight clearly helped Footy Classified early days where they were dominant.

Add to the fact viewers are still slow to embrace streaming services with the The Agenda Setters first on 7Mate at 7pm and then not shown on the main channel until much later, usually around 10.30pm.

On Sundays it’s no contest with Nine’s Sunday Footy Show clearly out-rating Seven’s new Footy Feast (88,700 to 20,800 on May 11).

TV expert Colin Vickery points out the legacy of Footy Classified and the Sunday Football Show is something viewers initially lean on.

“When you look at Footy Classified and the Sunday Footy Show, they have a history and they already have a popularity there,” he said. “As much as there has been a lot of change of personnel, at least at the start I think people are going to stick with what they know as the brand.

“They are well-known brands and initially people are going to go, ‘Well, I’ve always enjoyed Footy Classified so I’m going to just keep on watching it’. They may sample opposition shows but those opposition shows have to claim some ground.

“If people didn’t like Footy Classified that would be a different scenario but my gut feel is that people quite like the Sunday Footy Show, they quite like Footy Classified in the past so they’re not screaming out for a bunch of new footy shows because they already actually like the ones that are on air.”

Vickery also pointed out there was a historic “suspicion” about panel shows on the free-to-air host broadcaster.

“The thing that has helped Nine in the past I would say is there has always been a little bit of a suspicion around shows that are done by the host broadcaster, just how tough they will be, how authentic they will be,” Vickery said.

“I’m sure that’s why Seven got Kane Cornes, to try and cut through that a little bit because Nine has been like we’re not aligned to football so we can say it as it is.”

Vickery predicts the real story of what the viewers are thinking about the two shows won’t become fully clear until next season.

“Nine has come in come in with well-known brands that people trust and then it’s about Seven potentially getting some mojo happening,” he said. “That will probably take a full season so next season is when we’ll be able to see the real impact of those new shows.”

Fox Footy hasn’t released its rating figures for its new line-ups but the Foxtel Group viewing for live AFL games was up 10 per cent and that this year’s Anzac Day clash was the second most streamed regular season match of all-time and the fifth most watched regular season game for Fox.