The BBC has released a statement regarding the viewership figures for Match of the Day at the start of the 2025/26 Premier League season, approximately six months after Gary Lineker’s departure as manager.
Match of the Day has lost more than 10 per cent of its audience since Gary Lineker left the BBC. The former Leicester and Tottenham forward bid farewell to the British broadcaster at the end of last season.
Lineker was the host of Match of the Day for 26 years before leaving the role in May. The 64-year-old was due to remain at the BBC and cover the 2026 FIFA World Cup, but he has agreed to leave the company earlier than planned, with no payoff.
He left the BBC after sharing an anti-Semitic rat emoji on Instagram, which was the last straw for the broadcaster, which had refused to sack him despite testing its social media guidelines to the boiling point.
Mark Chapman, Gabby Logan and Kelly Cates will replace Lineker in the rotation from 2025/26 onwards, with Manchester United legend Wayne Rooney joining as a new pundit.
In the two months since the start of the new Premier League season, viewership of the BBC’s flagship soccer program has fallen from 2.68 million to 2.39 million, according to the Telegraph.
read more: Gary Lineker apologizes after doubts over two Chelsea decisions: ‘I shouldn’t have started rumors’read more: Gary Lineker set to return to football presenter as part of new program following BBC resignation
This is down 10 per cent on last season, but some viewers are said to be flocking to the broadcaster’s new online highlights on BBC iPlayer instead.
This season, the BBC has also started posting Premier League highlights on its website more than two hours before Match of the Day broadcasts, risking viewership numbers falling.
Company officials told the report that the clips are watched by an average of 1.7 million people each week. These changes come after Alex Keijelski was hired as athletic director last year.
Match of the Day’s numbers had been declining even before Lineker, the longest-serving host, stepped down. From August to October for the final season, viewership for the same period in 2023 was 2.92 million, down more than 8%.
The drop in “Match of the Day” coincides with a broader decline in TV ratings. This season, the show attracted an average of 34.8 percent of TV viewers, more than the same period the previous two years.
In a statement, the BBC said: “In the on-demand world, we don’t judge success based on overnight ratings. A significant proportion of Match of the Day viewers now watch on BBC iPlayer, the UK’s fastest growing streaming, video-on-demand platform.”
“This is not a decline. We are adapting to changing viewer behavior, as we should all be. Match of the Day is reaching more people on multiple platforms.”
The BBC downplayed any link to Match of the Day’s falling TV ratings, saying a high proportion of the show’s viewers were now watching it on iPlayer.
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