Karl Stefanovic‘s is yet to make his mark on the Today show with news that ratings are down on last year when Georgie Gardner and Deb Knight hosted the breakfast TV show.
The new look line-up – which includes the 45-year-old and former 60 Minutes star Allison Langdon – appears to be struggling against it’s rival, Sunrise.
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“Executives would be going, ‘Oh my god, we thought this was going to be hard but we are not getting an early bounce’,” media analyst Steve Allen revealed to the Confidential.
“We have been consistently saying that this will take time. Karl reappearing on screen isn’t going to mean all of the people that left the show have suddenly forgiven him. It will take time and he will need to keep his act clean and need to stay out of the headlines on anything about his personal life and his relationship with others inside the network.”
The new look line-up hit 199,000 people in the national five city metro market. Meanwhile, George and Deb hit 211,000 this same time last year.
The figures will most certainly hurt Nine execs, who took a bet on Karl winning back audiences on the ailing breakfast show after ditching the presenter last year.
“It is going to be a long game, the audience isn’t going to break their viewing habit quickly,” an industry executive told Daily Telegraph‘s Confidential back in January.
“It was premature for people to get excited by the first week’s figures. The brief honeymoon that accompanied the return of Karl with his new on air partner Allison Langdon at this stage was short lived. Sam [Armytage] and Kochie [David Koch] don’t seem to have too much to worry about yet.”
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