The 55th running of the Eurovision Song Contest will take place in the Oslo area, Host Broadcaster NRK and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) jointly announced today. The two Semi-Finals of the contest are now confirmed to take place on Tuesday 25 May and Thursday 27 May, the Grand Final on Saturday 29 May, 2010. A venue to host the competition is still to be chosen.
Česká televize have announced that they're pulling out of the Eurovision Song Contest because of poor viewing figures and 'lack of interest'. The Czech Republic have entered since 2007 according to the BBC but scored zero points last year in their semi. They also came last in their semi in 2007 apparently.
Oddly, in Slovakia the contest remains popular with the audience despite a similarly poor performance.
Yep - the Czech Republic only joined the Eurovision club relatively recently - ISTR that Slovakia has been competing since 1994 (though suffered relegation in the days before the semi-finals)
I suspect that means that Slovakia has more "history" than the Czech Republic?
I don't think Czechoslovakia entered as a single state prior to the Velvet Revolution though - ISTR that Yugoslavia was the only regular Communist entrant in the days of the Iron Curtain (but it was never a Warsaw Pact country in the way that most of the other Communist countries in the Eastern Bloc were)
I was going to post this on the Eurovision 2009 Moscow thread, but since its last reply was 25 May 2009, and this thread is now up and running, I'll post it here instead. Presumably the Eurovision 2009 thread should be locked now, so future Eurovision discussion can continue here.
Here is a league table of all countries that have participated in Eurovision Song Contest from 1956 to 2009 inclusive. The total is calculated on the following basis: in a given year, a country is awarded points for a top 10 place as follows:
The columns are in the following order: country name, years in Final, and total. Sorry I've been unable to align the columns neatly.
N.B. Final is used loosely here. From 1956 to 2003 there was only one ESC per year, that's what it refers to. Since 2004 , when there has been at least one semi-final, "final" refers to the Saturday night show. From 2004 onwards, "years in final" only counts the years that a country made it to the final, and ignores years when a country participated in a semi-final but failed to qualify. For example, Serbia appeared in the final in 2007 and 2008. This year they failed to make it past the semi-final, so their "years in final" count stays at 2.
Where there is a tie-break for total, with one or more points, the tied countries are sorted by entries in final lowest first. For example, Armenia took just 4 years to score 14 points, whereas Poland took 10 years to reach 14 points, so Armenia rank higher. However where there's a tie for nul points, the tied countries are sorted by entries in final highest first.
Andorra, Montenegro, Czech Republic and San Marino have so far never gone further than the semis, hence their "years in final" counts are zero.
As you can see the UK is the winner here. That's deceptive though as the UK has entered 52 times. Going by total alone doesn't take into account number of entries in final, which is unfair on the newer countries that have debuted since the 90s.
By dividing the total by years in final, we can find each country's average score per year it appeared in the final. Again, years in final excludes years a country failed to make it past the semi since 2004. It could be argued this is a fairer representation as it takes into account that recent newcomers (Ukraine, Serbia, Azerbaijan) have had nowhere near as many entries in the final as the early birds such as France, Germany and UK.
Notice now that Serbia is at the top. If it qualifies to the final and scores below 10th, i.e. nul points in this scheme of things, its average will become 17/3 = 5.67 which will place it below UK and Bulgaria (assuming their averages don't change).
Serbia-Montenegro is now stuck permanently on 7.00, as it scored 10 pts in 2004 for 2nd and 4 pts for 7th in 2005, total 14. They entered and withdrew last minute in 2006, but still voted. For these purposes that's a no entry year, and not counted, hence their "years in final" count stays at 2. The country ceased to exist in late 2006 and from 2007 Montenegro and Serbia entered separately. This is why Serbia-Montenegro's average will now always be 14/2 = 7.00.
Now the UK will need a fair few years of top ten results (if not top five) to eek ahead of Serbia-Montenegro's average. From 1956 to 1998 its average was over 7, but thanks to years of low positions (bar 2002 and 2009) since 1999, the UK has been riding the down escalator as far as its average is concerned. The UK did well this year, let's keep up the effort for future years.
Serbia 8.50
Serbia-Montenegro* 7.00
United Kingdom 6.02
Bulgaria 6.00
Azerbaijan 5.50
Ukraine 5.14
Ireland 5.13
Belarus 5.00
France 4.67
Monaco 4.62
Estonia 4.60
Italy 4.08
Israel 4.00
Russia 3.92
Sweden 3.76
Luxembourg 3.65
Armenia 3.50
Switzerland 3.46
Germany 3.32
Denmark 3.28
Latvia 3.25
Malta 2.95
Spain 2.78
Netherlands 2.64
Greece 2.40
Norway 2.38
Belgium 2.22
Yugoslavia* 2.15
Austria 1.90
Iceland 1.79
Croatia 1.75
Cyprus 1.65
Romania 1.64
Turkey 1.55
Moldova 1.50
Hungary 1.50
Poland 1.40
Bosnia-Herzegovina 1.13
Finland 1.05
Albania 1.00
Slovenia 0.90
Lithuania 0.71
Portugal 0.64
FYR Macedonia 0.00
Slovakia 0.00
Georgia 0.00
Morocco 0.00
Andorra 0.00
Montenegro 0.00
Czech Republic 0.00
San Marino 0.00
I don't think Czechoslovakia entered as a single state prior to the Velvet Revolution though - ISTR that Yugoslavia was the only regular Communist entrant in the days of the Iron Curtain (but it was never a Warsaw Pact country in the way that most of the other Communist countries in the Eastern Bloc were)
Correct, Czechoslovakia never entered the Eurovisoin Song Contest before it split into Czech Republic and Slovakia circa 1992/1993.
Slovakia debuted in 1994, then entered again in 1996 and 1998. Thanks to relegation they missed 1995, 1997 and 1999. However whereas they theoretically should have been back in 2000, they never returned until the one of the two 2009 semis, and failed to qualify.
Czech Republic debuted in the 2007 semi-final, and tried again in 2008 and 2009, but each time failed to quailify.
Does anyone know why it took so much longer for Czech Republic to debut than Slovakia?
Terry Wogan has given his blessing to Graham Norton's commentary of Moscow's Eurovision and said that he thought the contest was flawless and that the voting had been 'sorted out'. I must admit, I agree wholeheartedly. I much enjoyed Graham's commentary and thought the contest as a whole was the best in years.
Also, if a petition was made for NRK/the EBU to shoot Eurovision 2010 in 1080p50 do you think that would have a chance of being successful or do you think that would be a rubbish petition?