Muireann O’Connell gained thousands of listeners before being ‘fired’ from Today FM

Muireann O'Connell's radio show gained thousands of listeners in the period before she left Today FM.

The audience for her lunchtime slot grew from 93,000 to 96,000 over three months, according to the latest Joint National Listenership Research (JNLR) figures. It comes days after it was announced that she had been let go from the station. Muireann broke the news by tweeting;

"Hello lovely people! I have been fired from Today FM. "It's all good. Like it's embarrassing and I'm a bit sad but I love almost everyone in that station and wish them all the best in the future."

The news prompted shock among many in the media and from fans of the show. Today FM has not commented on her departure. It announced that Mairéad Ronan will be taking over the lunchtime slot with her own show. The cull at Today FM also saw Louise Duffy parting ways with the station. The new statistics show that her show lost 1,000 listeners book on book. Others who lost listeners at Today FM were Ian Dempsey and Matt Cooper. Matt's The Last Word was down 1,000 while the Ian Dempsey Breakfast Show was down 2,000. Fergal Darcy meanwhile gained 3,000 listeners book on book. Elsewhere there was bad news for Pat Kenny and Marion Finucane. Pat's morning show on Newstalk lost 8,000 listeners while the Marion Finucane Show on RTÉ One lost 8,000 listeners for Saturdays and 14,000 for Sundays.