Today (2015-Sept 2020)

News Corp reports this evening that Natalia Cooper won’t return to Today as a weather presenter. A Nine spokesman said Natalia had requested to go back to news, but sources said she was pushed out of the weather role because there are already three females (Deb, Georgie and Brooke) on the panel so a male (Steve Jacobs) was needed. Make of that what you will.
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/entertainment/confidential/today-weather-presenter-natalia-cooper-moved-from-role-while-on-maternity-leave/news-story/e34ce7fbdee6fdbbeb5b1aef930f48d7

This headline was inevitable, certainly doesn’t look good for Today IMO even though I think they made the right choice.

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Didn’t @blackbox reveal this weeks ago? Nine was very clear that Stevie was back for good.

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With Natalia Cooper expected to no longer present the weather on Today when she returns from maternity leave, do we expect Natalia to remain at the Nine or simply “warehoused” until the end of her contract?

Probably sent to report for ACA like Sylvia or something like that.

The flaw in their reasoning is noteworthy. So far this year, Stevie has done more weather segments in studio than the show has ever done since Monte Dwyer.

It says in the article that she will return to Nine News Sydney.

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Stevie has certainly tried hard to raise the banter amongst the team,l think that’s part of the reason why he has been in the studio.

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Nine is saying being in the newsroom is a more suitable environment and will give her more flexibility as a working parent than being on the road for Today.

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Imo many people are still watching sunrise today is because 1) they dont like what happned to karl and 2) they dont like how nine fired people when on hokidays ,me on the other hand couldnt stand karl and could no longer stand stand david koche or sam ,so iam glad that today went with geogie and deb to me they seem more up beat and kinda in my age range kinda so i can relate to them

I must agree that some people would have switched off because they basically axed their whole team.
Lots of people uproared about Tim Gilbert especially.

@TV.Cynic Any figures for Weekend Today v Weekend Sunrise?

Maybe he just brought a stable, likeable presence that’s asnt over the top and didn’t attract headlines. Severely underrated.

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Yeah…I’ve never been a huge fan of Ben Fordham, probably in part because of his history at ACA & 2GB.

As for Tim Gilbert, sure he was better than some of the other sports presenters/reporters still at Nine but I wouldn’t have prioritised keeping him at the network over talent like Yvonne Sampson (now O’Keefe, after getting married to TCN’s state politics reporter) who Nine stupidly allowed Fox League to pick up after 2016.

The show, for the most part, is rating where it’s rated for the last 2 years, I don’t think axing the team is the primary culprit.

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The last few weeks have seen some of the worst numbers the Today has received over the last 2 years. This week last year for example, Today was equal with Sunrise, winning on 2 days.

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There’s some pretty harsh comments about their new team on ‘Today’ on Facebook

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But the way everyone seems to be carrying on here makes it sound as though the show was Australia’s #1… but they weren’t . The show was always performing relatively bad (due to a number of factors such as content, rundown etc), the presenter changes made it worse.

There seems to be the perception and expectations that because Georgie and Deb are highly regarded and presented on Sydney’s Number 1 News that will automatically win the ratings. This is national and it isn’t a walk in the park.

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yeah i dont think every one like changes ,most find it difficult but it had to be done and this is the conquences

This includes the Today Show

I haven’t gotten that impression from reading the posts. People realise it will take a long process, however, the ratings the show is getting since the relaunch are some of the worst the show has had on a regular basis.

Remembering that in 2016 Seven took Nine to court when Nine stated promoting Today as Australia’s number one breakfast show with Nine eventually having to admit that their claim was based on the 5-city numbers - so clearly Today was number one then. The next year, prior to Lisa leaving, Today was on track to potentially another win, having won half of the ratings weeks up to that point. The show finished just 10,000 behind Sunrise.

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I read an article today from 2012 that was citing Today’s in roads on Sunrise. It said, positively, that the gap had closed to 50,000 - 80,000 daily. So their current performance against Sunrise isn’t awful .

However, after 7 years or so of gaining ground, Today were able to claim a win in the metro cities for 2016 (in an Olympic year for 7!). Despite Sunrise taking Nine to court, it did concern them so much so that they dumped nearly all the changes they made earlier in the year and began to rebuild.

So, Today’s current performance is definitely a backwards step, noteably when they are the lowest readings in 14 years. It can all be traced back to… Lisa’s resignation.

Not necessarily. Deb and Georgie are very familar faces to regular Today audiences. Georgie was the newsreader for 7.5 years and Karl and Lisa’s main fill-ins. Deb was the newsreader and host on Weekend Today for 6 years and was the interim host after Lisa quit. Both are very popular individually. So there might have been an expectation that they will do well because they know the genre.

The fact that they have both anchored Sydney’s 6pm News has ensured that they resonate with that market. As a result, there have been more wins in Sydney this year than last. Brisbane is tracking to be on par.