M arian Finucane and Joe Duffy are the biggest losers in the battle for listeners

MARIAN Finucane and Joe Duffy saw the biggest drops in listenership at RTÉ Radio One in the latest Joint National Listenership Survey (JNLR).

Finucane shed 37,000 listeners from this time last year on her Saturday show, but still retained one of the largest audiences on radio with 350,000 listeners.

She saw a more modest dip of 8,000 on Sunday, to

316,000. ‘Liveline’ with Joe Duffy lost 25,000 listeners from this time last year but is still one of the top radio programmes in Ireland, drawing in 370,000 listeners.

‘Today With Sean O’Rourke’ was down 18,000 from July but he is holding steady overall, shedding just 1,000 since this time last year. ‘Morning Ireland’, meanwhile, has seen a drop for the second year in a row, by 2,000. The flagship morning programme now pulls an audience of

434,000. Ryan Tubridy was down 4,000 since July but has gained 14,000 listeners since last year.

2FM saw significant gains across the board and with a reach of 404,000 listeners, the station beat Today FM’s 402,000. It was the first time the station has had a larger audience than its rival since the death of Gerry Ryan in

2010.

‘Breakfast Republic’ was the biggest success for the station, gaining 44,000 listeners since last year, to reach an audience of 189,000.

‘The Nicky Byrne Show’ with Jenny Greene has 151,000 listeners, an increase of 20,000, while Tracy Clifford and Eoghan McDermott have both reached 127,000 listeners, an increase of 17,000 and 18,000 respectively.

Veteran broadcaster Larry Gogan was up 9,000 listeners to 110,000 on Saturday and

8,000 to 78,000 on Sunday.

2FM boss Dan Healy said Gerry Ryan’s wife Morah called him shortly after the figures were released to congratulate the station.

“She said: ‘Wherever Gerry is, he would be absolutely thrilled’. It was lovely, really nice of her,” he said.

Despite a slightly larger audience, Today FM still has a higher share of the market, at 7.5pc, to 2FM’s

6.7pc. Ian Dempsey has decreased his listenership by 4,000 since last year and now has an audience of

169,000, giving him the most listened to breakfast show in the commercial sector.

Dermot & Dave, who moved to Today FM mid-mornings in January, grew their audience by

3,000 to 167,000

Al Porter has reached an audience of 118,000, gaining 5,000 listeners since last year.

On Newstalk, there have been some been some gains. Pat Kenny’s show is up 4,000 from last year to

150,000. ‘Newstalk Breakfast’ increased 6,000 year on year, up to 121,000. George Hook stepped down from his ‘High Noon’ slot last month after controversial comments made on air and Dr Ciara Kelly is the new presenter.

The slot gained 4,000 listeners for an audience of

102,000 since July. Sean Moncrieff has seen an increase of 13,000 since last year and has reached an audience of 79,000, ‘The Hard Shoulder’, presented by Ivan Yates since September 4, which was previously ‘Newstalk Drive’, hosted by Sarah McInerney and Chris Donoghue, is up

5,000 listeners since July.