So it's official: the FA Cup is more important than Brexit, and the very future of Britain's constitution. That's according to the TV viewing figures, anyway.
The BBC's decision to leave Southampton's FA Cup third-round replay against Derby on their flagship BBC One channel during extra-time, while relegating to BBC Two a key speech on Brexit made by Theresa May after her government narrowly won a no-confidence vote, has been criticised by many.
The corporation has been forced to defend itself for its call to delay the 10 o'clock news, which had been scheduled for BBC One, until after the football, saying in a statement: 'When the match went to extra time and penalties, we provided a live news special on BBC Two, and pointed viewers to this with on air and in vision signage. We also made clear that the news would begin straight after the match's conclusion.'
But, as figures released by Gary Lineker reveal, nearly a million more people watched the football than the crunch moment at Westminster.
Lineker's figures show that the football's audience dipped by 600,000 at the start of May's speech, from 3.9million to 3.3m; the prime minister attracted 1.8million extra viewers to BBC Two, with figures up from 0.7m during a documentary on former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez to 2.5m.
A mere five minutes later, however, 400,000 viewers had flooded back to the football, with 3.7m now tuning in; and by 10 past the hour with extra-time nearing its end that number had rocketed to 4.3m, a gain of one million from when the live news started.
May's speech, however, lost more than a million viewers by its conclusion, with ratings plummeting to 1.3m.
By the time the game at St Mary's reached its climax at 10.25pm, a whopping 4.6m had turned onto BBC One to see Frank Lampard's side win a penalty shootout, while just 1.1m were now watching the final minutes of the news. That meant that nearly four times the number of people watched the conclusion of the football than the conclusion of May's speech – 4.6m versus 1.3m.
Despite the ratings results, some were still angry at the BBC's decision to switch the news away from its flagship channel on such a momentous day in politics.
Roger Mosey, a vice-chancellor of Cambridge University and former BBC journalist, said on Twitter: 'No matter the bad luck of extra time in the football, the BBC News should have been on BBC One tonight at 10pm. The issues facing the country are more important than a 3rd round FA Cup replay.'
Lineker replied: 'Interesting that this is still considered important. Personally I don't have strong feelings either way but thought you'd like to know that 600K switched to BBC2 at 10 for the news. By 10.10 a million came back to BBC1. Football peaked at 4.6 for pens. 2m more than ensuing news.'
He then tweeted the statistics to back up his argument, although he did not acknowledge that the viewing figure changes were not simply down to people switching from one channel to the other.
Another prominent broadcaster, Danny Baker, was quick to dismiss any complaints about the football not making way for May. He tweeted: 'Yes the BBC always knows what's best for us. Put your ball away there's bland series of soundbites on the way from the Tory party. It was never going to be a resignation speech now was it?'
Jimmy Burgess, however, said: 'While I can't disagree with him that the news should certainly have taken precedence, I'm amused by the viewing figures - looks like the British people have had their fill of Brexit dominating.'
Sandy Markwick added: 'One was a game of no significance, puffed up and desperately trying to be relevant. The other was a 3rd round FA Cup replay btwn Southampton and Derby.'
Hugh Anderson wryly suggested that the government should learn a thing or two from the football, saying: 'Brexit should go to pens. May and the rest of her weekly 5 aside up against Juncker's team. No ABBA system. No confusion. 29th March Wembley Stadium - would sell it out.'
