Saturday night's first semifinal between Collingwood and West Coast "was the highest-rating television match" of the Australian Football League season, and it was rated higher than every match of the '11 season, except last year's grand final, according to Greg Denham of THE AUSTRALIAN. The game at the MCG stadium drew 1.925 million viewers nationally and was "the most-watched AFL game ever on pay television," with 422,000 viewers.
Adelaide's win over Fremantle in Friday night's semifinal at AAMI Stadium drew 1.753 million viewers and ranked as "the third-most watched match on subscription TV," with an audience of 394,000.
Both matches of the second week of the finals series grossed 3,679,185 viewers nationally, 862,000 more viewers than the second week of the '11 finals (THE AUSTRALIAN, 9/18).
ICE TIME: QUOTENMETER.de's Manuel Weis reported that the German Hockey League's (DEL) TV partner ServusTV "attained respectable ratings" for its Week 1 coverage. The season opening match between Cologne and Krefeld attracted about 50,000 viewers or a 0.2% market share on Friday night. In the marketing relevant target group 14-49, the share was slightly higher with 0.3%. ServusTV's regular air time for its "Servus Hockey Night" program is Sundays, where its pregame show attracted 70,000 viewers or 0.7% at 5:25pm CEST. ServusTV's live broadcast of the game between Mannheim and defending champion Berlin was watched by an average of 80,000 people, "which is good considering" that at the same time Sky showed live Bundesliga football and Sport1 live handball (QUOTENMETER.de, 9/17).
KICK IT: MEEDIA.de's Jens Schröder reported that German pay-TV channel Sky "set a season ratings record for its Bundeliga coverage" with 1.21 million viewers on Saturday afternoon. Sky obtained a 10% market share. The "highest-rated match on Saturday afternoon" was the match-up between Bayern Munich and FSV Mainz 05 with 210,000 viewers. The "highest rated match of the game day" was the Saturday evening game between Schalke 04 and Greuther Fürth, which attracted 730,000 viewers (MEEDIA.de, 9/17).
