Uefa president Michel Platini's hope that switching the Champions League final from Wednesday night to Saturday night would attract more families was dashed, at least as far as television viewers were concerned, by last month's Inter Milan-Bayern Munich final. TV Sports Markets, a SportBusiness Group publication, reports that a demographic breakdown of the free-to-air television audiences for the 2010 final in Europe's big five markets, by audience research firm Eurodata TV Worldwide, shows that outside the two finalists' home countries, fewer families were watching.

More worryingly for Uefa, football's European governing body, the Saturday final was a ratings flop in two of the big five markets across all age groups.

The final had its lowest ever audience in France and its lowest since at least 1998 in the UK. The UK's ITV told TV Sports Markets that it would like the final to return to Wednesday.

The cumulative free-to-air audience for the final across the big five markets was 36.9 million, down 18.5 per cent on last year.

Last year's final between Barcelona and Manchester United was also unusually successful in ratings terms, due to the widespread interest - even among neutrals - in both teams.

The cumulative free-to-air audience for last year's final was 45.347 million, compared to 39.226 million in 2007, 37.617 million in 2008, and 36.949 million this season.

Any disappointment Uefa may feel with the audience for the final will be tempered by the fact that average audiences over the 2009-10 season were up in four of the five major markets.

The exception was the UK, where no team from England's Premier League made it past the quarter-final stage for the first time since 2003.