TV viewing round-up: March 2016

There was a happy outcome for England supporters still smarting after the team’s early exit from last year’s Rugby World Cup, with the national side winning this year’s 6 Nations championship.

BBC One’s coverage of France vs England saw the latter side battle to a 31-21 victory and was watched by an average audience of 6.4 million.

ITV also profited from Eddie Jones’ team’s run to grand slam glory, with England vs Wales grabbing 5.5 million viewers.

On a different sporting front ITV’s coverage of the England football team’s friendly matches garnered decent viewing figures for the channel.

First up was the 3-2 away win for Germany vs England, which pulled in 6.2 million viewers. This was followed a few days later by England vs Netherlands, with 5.7 million people catching a 2-1 for Roy Hodgson’s side.

The Night Manager reached its conclusion last month as Tom Hiddleston’s Jonathan Pine finally got to take down Hugh Laurie’s smooth and calculating arms dealer Richard Roper.

The spy series ended its six week run with 9.1 million viewers, an increase of nearly 900,000 on the début episode.

Nearly 25 years after ITV’s previous adaptation of Georges Simenon’s literary creation, March saw Rowan Atkinson follow in Michael Gambon’s footsteps and take on the role of Maigret.

The first in a series of feature length episodes saw the detective hunting down a serial killer in 1950s Paris and was watched by 6.8 million people.

Our Queen at 90, following closely on the heels of January’s Prince’s Trust documentary, once again gave ITV some right royal ratings.

Covering a year in the life of the nation’s longest reigning monarch, with contributions from various members of the Royal Family, the two-hour programme was seen by 6.5 million viewers.

Other programmes that did well in March include: The A Word (5.9 million); Shetland (5.7 million); MasterChef (5.6 million); Saturday Night Takeaway (7.4 million); Antiques Roadshow (6 million); and March’s most-watched show Call The Midwife (10.9 million).

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