MUMBAI: If there is one television genre that is seeing a lot of activity, it is the sports genre. Recently Zee Sports launched albeit without the cushion of India cricket. Now Ten Sports has put out data stating that it is head and shoulders above the competition on all fronts.

The channel has quoted Tam data from 30 April 2005 to 11 June 2005 c&s4+ all India. For each week in that period it had an average share of 1.46 per cent.
 

This is more than the combined share of ESPN Star Sports (ESS) and DD Sports. Star Sports has a share of 0.32. ESPN has a share of 0.24 and DD Sports has a share of 0.15. Clearly when India cricket is not there viewers switch off DD Sports.

What this data also indicates is that TNA Wrestling which airs on ESS has not managed to match the popularity of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). If it had then the gap would not have been so big. Of course one must keep in mind the fact that TNA Wrestling has only just started. Ten Sports also gained due to quality non India cricket like South Africa and Pakistan's tour of West Indies.

However as Taj Television India MD Sharmista Rijhwani points out it is not only WWE that viewers watch. "If that was the case then the viewership share would not be so high. Our other shows like Sport Update, Legends are watched. Our viewership is strong at 67 per cent share among sports channels without live India cricket. With India cricket next month we expect it to cross 80 per cent."

On the GRP front the story is similar. Ten Sports got an average of 50.5 GRPs each week compared with 10.9 for Star Sports, 8.2 for ESPN and 5.0 for DD Sports. On the distribution front Ten Sports had signed a deal with the One Alliance in March. The channel managed an average reach of 30 per cent which is slightly more than ESS' reach of 26.8 per cent. DD Sports' reach stands at 9.6 per cent.