RTÉ score with Six Nations rugby shoot-out

Saturday’s sensational Six Nations shoot-out proved a massive ratings winner for RTÉ with more people watching the dramatic final minutes of England and France than the closing stages of Ireland’s win over Scotland.

Ireland’s clash with Scotland garnered an average audience of 697,000 with the viewership peaking at 852,380 at 4.15pm in the final minutes of the game. The Murrayfield match had a reach (those who tuned in for at least a minute during the game) of 1.06 million.

But with the title to be decided on points differential it meant that viewers remained glued to the station’s coverage of the final game of the tournament between England and France as Stuart Lancaster side’s raced to pip the Irish to the title.

The Twickenham tussle had an average of 656,500 (a 55% share with a reach of 1.3 million). And incredibly 891,030 Irish viewers tuned in at 6.56pm as England failed to find the extra points which would have crowned them champions.

Saturday was also a record breaking day for the BBC with an audience of 9.63 million watching England v France. A peak of 4.1m watched Italy v Wales, while 5.1m tuned in for Scotland v Ireland and the BBC Sport website recorded its highest ever traffic on the day, with 8.22m unique UK browsers — beating the previous record of 8.03 million during the London Olympics in 2012.