England's opening World Cup qualifying group game gave ITV a decent audience on Friday night (October 12).
Between 7.30pm and 10.10pm, an average of 5.5 million (25%) watched England's 5-0 victory over San Marino.
Have I Got News For You returned with 5.09m (22.1%) and anchored BBC One's schedule in the 9pm slot with its reaction to the Jimmy Savile revelations.
However, new comedy Me and Mrs Jones launched with a modest 3.13m (14.2%) at 9.30pm after News For You. Nigel Slater's Dish of the Day (4.96m/24.4%) and Miranda (4.29m/19.1%) secured solid audiences earlier on.
Elsewhere, The Million Pound Drop Live entertained 1.39m (6.2%) on Channel 4 (+1: 187k/1.1%), Eddie Stobart: Trucks and Trailers interested 1.18m (5.2%) on Channel 5 (+1: 113k/0.8%), and QI (2m/10.6%) topped BBC Two in its 10pm slot.
Overall, ITV1 topped primetime with 23% (+1: 0.4%), ahead of BBC One's 20.4%. BBC Two earned third place with 7.7%, beating Channel 4's 5.2% (+1: 0.7%), and Channel 5's 3.3% (+1: 0.3%).
Meanwhile, The Chase retained its lead over Pointless at teatime, managing 2.65m (19.7%) on ITV1 (+1: 183k/1%) compared to the BBC One gameshow's 2.33m (16.2%).
The X Factor USA was the most-watched multichannel broadcast with 645k (2.9%) on ITV2 in the 9pm hour, adding 116k (0.7%) on timeshift.
Posted: Mon Oct 15, 2012 12:08 pm