AceShowbiz - U.S. newsman Larry King has defended his CNN talk show replacement Piers Morgan after his program received poor ratings, putting the low viewer figures down to too much hype ahead of its launch.

The 77 year old announced last summer he was leaving his nightly show and the British TV personality was revealed as the new host. Morgan dominated headlines ahead of the program's January relaunch - but his interviews have failed to win over as many viewers as King's chat show.

However, the veteran newsman has praised Morgan as "a fine broadcaster", insisting the show may have been "oversold" to the American public. He tells Britain's Radio 4, "I think he's a fine broadcaster. I haven't seen a lot, but the times I've seen, they have been fine."

"One of the problems they did was to oversell it - they said he was going to be dangerous, he was going to be water-cooler talk, it was 'Wait till you see me, I'm different.' Well, he's good - but he's not that dangerous. Maybe there's one thing, he's been oversold."