Welcome to another edition of the ESC Insight Newsletter available for you fifty weeks away from the next Eurovision Song Contest Final. We will be publishing fortnightly over the summer break and the Eurovision news thankfully slows down, but should still be interesting to those avid lovers of the Contest.
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In terms of Eurovision news, of course we feature lots about Sweden’s win and some of the fallout from the jury and televote results which revealed a dramatic split this year. We also find some of the best Eurovision news from across the web as well as bringing you Robertson’s Reflection, our column by Newsletter Editor Ben Robertson. Today he’s telling us about his unique Eurovision viewing experience, in a Australian bar in Stockholm cheering on Sweden’s victory wildly.
But that voting was far too close for comfort. I’d called Sweden to pick up momentum through the teens in the voting order, and although it was doing us it wasn’t at the expense of Russia quickly enough. Taking the Estonian and Latvian high scores kept it clearly in the lead, and although the Belarussian 10 points to Måns did signify a switch would happen back to Scandinavia the mood was particularly tense. I wouldn’t want to draw such monumental hyperbole to the feeling when Nigella Lawson switched the order of the top two, but the cheers around the room were of a similar East/West relief as the Miracle on Ice. When Lithuania sealed the deal by ignoring Polina’s entry (deliberately so too, two Lithuanian jurors placed her dead last) we knew party time was coming and we could cheer the points arriving.
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