New boss Breen refuses to count his chickens as Today sees strongest start to ratings in eight years

The battle for breakfast television has tightened dramatically with Nine’s Today moving past Seven’s Sunrise this week with its best early ratings season launch in eight years.

The development comes as something of a surprise after Today struggled with its ratings in the summer break while the show’s regular hosts were on holiday. By contrast, Sunrise kept a roster of its hosts on air.

This week – the second of the official ratings year – Today has won four consecutive days – and will ultimately win the week, according to preliminary OzTAM ratings.

Yesterday Today again won with 374,000 capital city viewers to Sunrise’s 362,000.