London 2012 Olympic Closing Ceremony and World Cup 2018 smash TV rating list of 2010s

The winners of the 2010s ratings war has been revealed and it’s pretty safe to say – us Brits really love our sports.

In the top 10 programmes of the decade, eight are sports shows – mainly the London 2012 Olympics and the 2018 World Cup.

According to ratings site Overnights.tv, the 2012 Closing Ceremony featured the biggest and best of UK’s historical musical talent making an appearance, with The Spice Girls reuniting after decades to perform together as a five piece on the top of iconic black cabs.

Topping the list, the country was well and truly united, with 24.5million tuning in to watch the prestigious and landmark three-hour event take place, ending with The Who extinguishing the Olympic flame and Rio De Janeiro being represented as the 2016 take up the mantle.

It was half a million up on the opening ceremony, which came a close second place thanks to its video messages and mini-films that also celebrated the Best of British.

Starting with the Queen joining James Bond (Daniel Craig) on a special mission, the show set the tone with our reigning monarch “diving in to the stadium” (which we will maintain to this day is the actual queen and not a stunt double”).

World Cup 2018 also featured heavily on the list, topped overall by the gut-punching 2-1 loss against Croatia in the semi-finals that sent England home.

There were only two non-sporting events that actually managed to sneak their way into the list; the 2010 X Factor finale – where Matt Cardle was crowned winner over One Direction, and EastEnders’ 25^th anniversary live episode.

EastEnders’ live special saw the reveal of who killed Archie Mitchell (Larry Lamb), a whodunit that started on Christmas Day 2009 and run until the reveal on 19 February 2010, 25 years since the show began.

It was revealed that Stacey Slater had done the deed out of numerous suspects that all had motive and means to kill the evil resident of Albert Square.

The seventh series of X Factor win saw Matt Cardle reach the Christmas number one in 2010 with a cover of Biffy Clyro’s When We Collide (originally titled Many Of Horror).

He beat out a little known band called One Direction… who no one has heard of since.

Wonder whatever happened to them? Oh yeah. They took over the world – we remember now.

Rebecca Ferguson came third that year, and also remains in the industry.

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