Eurovision 2019

I'd say that it is extremely unlikely that UK would not take part next year.

Even if the BBC declined, ITV or Channel 4 could, theoretically, enter instead. As UKGameshows go to great pains at every Eurovision event to point out*, it's technically a competition between broadcasters.

That said, I don't think it'd hurt the United Kingdom to take a year off and seriously think about what we're fielding because it's not good enough. My jaw is still on the floor due to the fact that the BBC rejected a song that went on to be picked up by ORF and win the jury vote! Storm wasn't the best song on the night, but it was certainly not the third worst. The BBC issue is not that "everyone hates us", it's nothing to do with Brexit, it's not in any way political. If we were that hated, we wouldn't be such an attractive place to live and work despite our (normally) rubbish climate.

Nah. The BBC is ultimately behind the curve. It's great that we've got a National Final again, and the production values are getting (marginally) better every year. The problem, however, is the songs that get shortlisted. We end up with six songs, mostly from Scandinavian writing camps, that are all very much written by committee and also written with the intention of entering EYD. The public's rejection of Sweden (an OK song which won a remarkably weak Melfest trying to find the new Despacito - should've called Cyprus) illustrates that the formulaic "Scandi pop-by-numbers" approach isn't cool anymore. In the early part of the decade, You're Not Alone , Never Give Up On You and Storm would have been genuine contenders. The issue is that the charts have moved on. Most of the Top 10 were there because they were bloody good songs, not songs designed to win Eurovision - and Eurovision 6 or 7 years ago at that.

* UKGS famously only used to say who the broadcaster was and not the country, thinking that the average man in the street knows who or what SVT, AMPTV, C1R, KAN, NRK or TF2 are. So they'd say something daft like "The BBC suffered a stage invasion." They now compromise with "SVT (represented on-screen as "Sweden") sent Benjamin Ingrosso..." They have a curious affinity for the kids version over there, too.

The BBC of all broadcasters would be the last to fall for political pressure to boycott Eurovision in Israel whether held in Jerusalem or elsewhere.

I think an Israeli contest should be boycotted for not giving us Israel Winton this year.

I know it was a new broadcaster this year but he should have been brought back in memory of an obscure British broadcaster.

Some very good points there. I think ultimately, the UK’s entries simply don’t stand out on the night. There’s a real lack of confidence and an unwillingness to do anything even slightly edgy or sexy.

Absolutely. The betting market and fanbase didn't just get drunk but got paralytic on Legends by 16 year old former BGT contestant Asanda, but she was dreadful in Brighton, both in the venue (I was present) and on TV when I watched it back. Conversely, SuRie, who wasn't really on anyone's radar going into the show, sold the song superbly and had the entire Dome in the palm of her hand. She did a really, really good job - and in Lisbon even without the stage invasion, at her "preview" recording and during the Jury Final, the entire crowd were singing along. (That said, they also went nuts for Jess Mauboy and she bottomed the public vote!)

This whole "Eurovision-By-Numbers" approach to EYD is what's holding us back. We need to bring EYD together with BBC Introducing, an approach the BBC were too premature to jettison after Molly didn't work out. Rather than Scandi camps and Voice/X Factor alumni, why not have the writers and singers come from Introducing? Maybe even have regional finals on the radio?

Like you say, we're not bold enough, we're not confident enough. The UK can absolutely win Eurovision again, and it is the BBC and the BBC alone who are to blame for why we haven't produced a win in 21 years.

One thing I've noticed is since we've gone to EYD we've not used backing dancers. This year I'm not sure about, but last year with Lucie's song, why couldn't a beautiful lyrical dance have been added - possibly with two guys? Worked for Ireland! They could have just had Ryan singing his song and playing his guitar with the backing singer on piano, but instead they sold the song with something truly beautiful that people remembered (and I remember the huge cheer the two guys got in the hall every time they crossed the bridge on to the stage at the start of the second verse.) And the LGBTQ+ community got to stick it to China at the same time as a bonus.

If we're going to Israel the BBC need to burn the rule book and be bold. They need to forget the UK public's perception of Eurovision (in any case, EYD is normally scheduled in a way that only hardcore fans will seek it out) and try something that hasn't been tried before, at least not by the UK. Do something that's gonna generate headlines - look at the hype around Netta.

It can be done. We can win again. It would be so amazing just to drop a musical bomb one year and prove everyone wrong.

First of all, I appreciate the BBC is beginning to take Eurovision seriously again. Terry Wogan complaining about no-one voting for us when we were sending stuff that was hilariously out of touch or actual musical excrement seeped through to the public, and everyone started to believe the "no-one likes us" schtick. There were undoubtedly issues with voting back then but it was massively overplayed.

The BBC appears to be playing a slow game, educating the public on what wins Eurovision (even if they can't quite produce it themselves) and going for relatively credible songs over novelty. Graham Norton is also a huge part of this mix, as someone who is more likely to laugh with the contest rather than at it, like his predecessor.

The BBC has rebuilt some credibility but it now needs to gamble. Because what it's doing by picking safe is picking stuff the televote will completely miss. If you're watching on the night you're voting for one, maybe two, songs that you've liked all night, in a crowded field. Who's going to feel the need to pick up the phone to vote for our song from last year? Unless we try something different we're going to continue with songs which do moderately well with the juries, who have to rank everything, and terribly with the public.

This is true. And the important thing is only the hard-core fans involve themselves with following the National Finals, the pre-parties, the music videos on YouTube, listening to the songs on Spotify and even bothering with the Semi Finals. For the average UK fan, this is still strictly a one-night-only affair. They tune in at 8pm on the Saturday, enjoy Graham's witty sideways look at the show, and might pick up the phone and vote for the song they remembered after sitting through 26 of them, most likely whilst drinking something alcoholic. Even if the UK left the Big Five I still don't think you'd get any sort of audience increase for the midweek shows.

Even elsewhere where countries have to compete in the midweek shows, it's the Saturday night that delivers the ratings. But still, the majority of the audience are hearing those songs for the first time. You can't afford to have a song grow on you after a few listens. In many cases the UK are disadvantaged because the song only has one, not two, competitive performances on television. So whatever you send has to land a perfect strike first time. And that's the real challenge.

Worth noting that last year for the first time in a while we did better with the public than we did with the juries. I fear had the stage invasion not happened, the song would have finished dead last but I imagine many televoters felt the need to reward the professional way in which SuRie handled a traumatic situation.

The most difficult thing to explain to the people who go "well, they just all hate us" is that even had we finished last, it doesn't necessarily mean everyone hates us or we're in the wrong direction.

The UK had a task to rebuild a reputation as a country that takes the song contest seriously again. It's in the process of doing that. I'm more optimistic than I was, I think we're a few years rather than a generation away from everyone being on the one page. The remaining problem is our Boaty McBoatface mentality: if you put a joke song in there people will vote for it instead of something good. So everything ends up worthy.

Having said that, the new voting system no longer punishes songs loved by the audience and hated by the juries as it once did. The juries can't cancel out the audience, so if the BBC sent along a fun song which was executed well - see Moldova's efforts - then it wouldn't win, but it could do very well.

It will be interesting to see how the BBC proceeds this year. Guy Freeman, who has Executive Produced the BBC's Eurovision selection process since 2014 left the BBC shortly after producing the show that selected this year's entry.

He was the Exec that - at least in part (commissioners and controllers may also have input one would expect) - moved us away from the Engelburt/Bonnie era to the Molly, Electro Velvet, Joe and Jake, Lucie Jones, Surie era. He also produced the 1998 contest in Birmingham, so had a long standing history with the contest.

There is an element of danger in Guy leaving because, as you say, he has progressed the UK beyond the era of joke entries and relying on veterans doing album tracks into an element of credibility. I do wonder if he'd taken us as far as he could though.

The two remaining issues for UK entries are staging, because we have absolutely no idea how to do it (albeit it has improved from the era when we just focused on a quirky drummer) and that little X factor that pushes a song from good to great. Hopefully, the person who takes over can now identify that.

Helen Riddell is now HoD, but she's been job sharing with Guy for a couple of years. I'm not sure how much input Guy had this year although Helen and he certainly produced EYD as I saw them both in Brighton. Guy had left the Corporation by the time Lisbon rolled around.

I don't agree we've gone as far as we could go, if anything, Guy's left Helen some great building blocks to take things forward. Melodifestivalen UK is asking a bit much, but I certainly feel a model like France's Destination Eurovision would be attainable (which of course was produced by ITV Studios France.)