Cat and mouse games are always being played by Seven and Nine with Nine returning its balls right across the network this week and also dropping the word ‘Channel’.
Subtly when you now listen to a promotion for Nine, all it says is... “Coming Up...Cold Case 8.30 Wednesday... On Nine”
While Sunrise and the Today Show seem to rotate summer presenters to the minute and to the genre with Cameron Williams taking the male co-host role on Today and Matthew White taking the Sunrise stool at Seven.
Funny isn’t it that both networks decided to use sport anchors to host sunrise will leaving their leading ladies, Lisa Wilkinson and Melissa Doyle on air over the Christmas break.
When the new year arrived, so did a new summer team with Larry Emdur and Kylie Gillies from the Morning Show take over Sunrise while Nine have used regular fill-ins Richard Wilkins and Georgie Gardner.
Summer schedueling is a scary time for presenters because someone can take your job...
Seven’s Mel and Kochie need not worry and I note their slap in the face to Nine using both Sharyn Ghidella and Jessica Rowe at times during the summer as fill-in newsreaders on Sunrise.
On Nine a fresh team lead by Georgie and Richard with News provided by Sarah Harris. This formula looks good, new and fresh and get my vote.
Karl Stefanovick works well when he fills in for Tracy Grimshaw on A Current Affair while Tracy is wasted fronting that show. She should be given her own midday type show or even Sunday.
Whilst National Nine News is being read by Peter Overton these past two weeks and what a good job he is doing. Good suits, ties and shirts, similarly with Cameron Williams.
Mark Ferguson always dresses smartly but remember when a certain Jim Waley took his summer vacation Fergo...
One thing Nine still has over Seven is the wardrobe... seriously, Nine’s presenters always look professional while Seven’s still need some work including Ian Ross’ tie selection.
Some things may evolve out of summer news and current affairs scheduling which assist networks with future projects. Nine has been the winner with summer experiments.
Michael Usher, Brett McLeod, Peter Overton and Sarah Harris are more than capable of having wider on-air news reading roles.
Cameron Williams is versatile and could potentially do other projects having amicably co-hosting the Today Show.
Matthew White is still too fresh faced and young, typecast as a Sports Broadcaster on Seven and didn’t deliver on Sunrise or reading the Weekend News.
Nevertheless the people whom the networks experiment with over summer are in the thoughts of programmers so lets see what evolves in 2008.
