Premiership Rugby Kicks Off With Record Audience

08 Sep 2016 | tshego

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Aviva Premiership rugby kicked off with a record-breaking weekend on television both at home and abroad, according to organisers.

For the first time in the history of the competition more than one million people watched the opening round of Aviva Premiership Rugby in the UK and Ireland on both BT Sport and ITV Sport.

Across the UK and Ireland, 1.057 million people watched Aviva Premiership Rugby in this weekend on BT Sport and ITV Sport.

It means that the 2016/17 season becomes the best television audience for an opening weekend, beating 861,000 in 2014.

The competition was also broadcast live on NBC in America for the first time, in 175m households across the world.

Gloucester Rugby v Leicester Tigers achieved a peak audience of 257,000 on BT Sport, the most ever for a Friday night fixture.

“These figures represent a fantastic start to the new season and shows the huge appeal of Aviva Premiership Rugby worldwide,” said Dominic Hayes, commercial director at Premiership Rugby.

“This season sees a step change in the global reach of Aviva Premiership Rugby. The competition is now broadcast in more countries, more often than ever before with every single game live on TV somewhere in the world.

“We saw matchday attendances rise 2% in 2015/16 and that trend has continued with a 10% year-on-year rise at Twickenham on Saturday for the London Double Header and impressive crowd figures at other grounds.”