Brits in Europe swell audience for ITV1

The audience for ITV1's Champions League football continued to grow last night as the English-dominated competition reaches its final stages.

Coverage of the semi-final first leg between Liverpool and Chelsea attracted 8.1m, a third of the viewing audience, from 7.30pm to 10pm. The match itself, starting at 7.45pm, was watched by 9.5m (38%).

ITV1's previous game in the European tournament - Arsenal's quarter final defeat to Liverpool - drew 7.5m (31.1%) and, the week before that, 6.4m (26.6%) watched Manchester United versus AS Roma.

On Tuesday the channel will screen the semi-final second leg between Manchester United and Barcelona, then the final on May 21. ITV shares coverage of the tournament with Sky.

Unsurprisingly, the other channels suffered in ITV1's wake.

On BBC One, 8.2m (38.6%) watched EastEnders at 7.30pm, but the audience dropped off when Holby City began at 8pm. The medical drama fell from 6.1m (26%) last week to 5.4m (21.8%). Then at 9pm Waking the Dead was watched by 5.9m (23.9%) - down from 6.6m (28.2%).

Channel 4's How to Look Good Naked won 2.3m (9.3%) at 8pm, down from 2.8m last week.