The eagerly awaited split jury and televote scores have been published. They can be found here. In the final, Loreen smashed the jury vote; she was a narrow winner over the Russian Babushki in the televote, these two acts quite a distance clear of Serbia in third with the viewing public, who incidentally gave France nul points.
In terms of those qualifiers who relied on juries or televoters, in the first semi-final, Hungary climbed above Switzerland with the juries having finished just behind the Sinplus boys in the televote. In the second semi-final, juries helped put through both Malta and Ukraine (a shocking second last in the televote). Turkey relied on a strong televote to go through.
A full analysis will follow within the next day or so, but if you want to post your initial reactions below, please do.
I’m genuinely quite surprised about Engelbert’s placing at the bottom of the jury vote. I had thought that his extensive career (I was led to believe he was a big name known all across Europe) and classic charm would appeal to the juries, yet the higher placing came from the televote.
Hi Charlotte and welcome to Sofabet. Having watched the dress rehearsal that juries based their decision on that Friday night, I am not surprised. Engelbert’s performance was poor, certainly far worse than he delivered on the Saturday night.
I love the fact Anggun got a televote of the proverbial “nul points”. Quelle surprise. (Just exhausted my entire French knowledge there.) But I am surprised it came 13th in the jury vote – ahead of Kaliopi, Iceland, Bosnia etc. However, I guess we are only talking about small points differences.
The main things that leap out at me:
– Pasha Parfery was 2nd(!!!!) in the jury vote in the semi and 9th(!) in the final. I know he’s cute and it’s catchy and fun but come on. And yet juries hated the not-dissimilar, arguably more credible Turkey (13th in the jury vote in the semi, 22nd in the final). What gives? Are Can’s weak vocals to blame?
– Televote-wise, Jedward came 4th in the semi and 10th in the final. However, they went down like a turd in a fountain with the juries, bringing their overall result down a lot.
– Iceland didn’t fare well with juries in either the semi or the final. Hmm. Neither did Denmark in the final. Hmm.
– Belgium was bottom of the televote in its semi and near the bottom of the jury vote. SADFACE
– I’m not surprised Ukraine did so badly in the televote, but I am surprised it did so well among juries (3rd in the jury vote in its semi and 7th in the final). Gaitana has a great voice and makes the most out of the song, but the song is barely there.
– Norway came 6th in the televote in its semi, so not all doom and gloom for Tooji. However, it came last in the jury vote in the semi. (To be fair, the performance was all over the place.)
– Georgia came 8th in the jury vote in its semi and last in the televote. I have to side with the public on that one; it has no redeeming features. Conversely, Bulgaria came second-to-last in the jury vote but 9th in the televote. Again, I have to go with the public on that one.
– Surprised Hungary didn’t get more jury points in the final.
– Italy and Spain bombed in the televote but were rewarded highly by juries. This is why, despite my minor quibbles above, the 50%-jury system works and why the contest needs it.
Wow. Iceland doing better with televoters than the jury–what’s that about? A somewhat well-known singer, a telegenic duo, the violin, the effective staging? I thought the juries would eat up the earnestness and melodrama. Apparently not. Greece also did better with the juries–WHAT? It was cheap and not especially well done and it’s always seemed that Greece, by nature of being Greece, has a slight handicap with the juries.
Cyprus doing better in the juries didn’t surprise me at all however. I saw Ivi as this year’s Getter Jaani, cute young girl with decently (if not very well) performed fun pop song and Getter, IIRC, also did better with the juries. Other than Ivi, however, much of the jury vote didn’t make much (any sense) to me. Albania at the top–okay, I get that. But Moldova, Greece, and Cyprus beating Denmark, even if the latter *was* slightly off-key? Weird. And Russia beating Iceland…maybe a pity vote for the babushki? Totally furious the juries ignored Switzerland though–it was my favorite in the semi and I always thought mobilizing the televoters would be a greater struggle.
Second semi: Well done, Ott–I didn’t think he’d get quite that many televotes but he deserved every last one. No clue why Lithuania went over so well with the voters–could be the draw, cute singer, (lame) high concept idea, who knows. Juries were right, IMO, to feel so-so about it.
Tooji pulled an Alexej Vorobjov. And Netherlands qualified based on the televote…I hate to say it but I saw that coming. I need to voice these insights so I can feel really smart and good about myself later 🙂 Even in the Dutch final it was televoter friendly (juries had it a distant last). I’m surprised Ukraine did so poorly with televoters–it struck me as a televote-friendly entry. Anyone have an explanation?
Trying to check the final scoreboard on wikipedia and it’s literally getting edited as I type this. From what I can see though…
RE UK: Englebert’s song was good, yes, but not only did he not sing that well, I think the juries were not loving the UK’s approach–i.e., send out the most famous person willing to do it and hope fame mobilizes televotes. Perhaps a similar case can be made for Ireland? Jedward did quite well with televoters but in both the semi and final the juries seemed to hate them. Sick of them? Just a bad performance? Meh.
Can’t help but LOL at Iceland and Lithuania. The juries and televoters agreed on which placing they deserved both this year AND last year.
No real shockers we didn’t see in the semis other than what I’ve mentioned–Italy, Spain, and Estonia hitting top 10 thanks to the juries, Romania doing much better with the public, Sweden just beating Russia in the televote (because no way would the juries top 10 Russia–they had to almost pull an Italy 2011). A little suprirsed juries like Moldova better than the televoters did with that draw, though, and Greece pulled a Jedward and flip-flopped from being jury-preferred to televoter-preferred.
At least these surprises keep us on our toes and give us something to talk about in the off-season. Can’t wait to see the proper analysis soon.
Hi Emma and ev, so much to talk about! One country at a time and the one I’ll give an honourable mention to is Moldova’s Pasha Parfeny. His performances in front of the juries were superb. I tweeted during the Friday jury final that his performance was ‘one of the best of the night’. He looked a little more heavy-legged and nervous in comparison for televoters on Saturday night, I felt.
Probably shouldn’t be posting this from work but I just had to chirp in and say that I am DISGUSTED that in the final Russia came 11th in the jury vote.
…of Tunbridge Wells.
Biggest surprises: Russia 11th with the juries, was expecting a little lower. Wow, loreen was almost beaten in the televote. Turkey had a big split, but 22nd with the juries? a little too harsh. But biggest shock of all: Ukraine! Gaitana’s 7th with the jury will go to the same x-files folder in my drawer as Saade’s televoting 2nd. And her 20th with the televote will make me think twice when deciding to make ukraine one of my biggest qualification bets again! Is it the first time that a country with such a big split in the semi qualified? have to research!
Hi Panos, regarding Ukraine certainly no country has qualified from second last in the televote or with that low a public score. It’s worth bearing in mind the country’s poor scores in 2003 and 2005, and the fact that ‘Be My Valentine’ surprisingly did pretty much as well with juries as with televoters. As a result, I’ve never had it in my list of big hitters in terms of voting allies.
I know Daniel and I agree. However, I think due to the fact that Ukraine’s recent entries faired surprisingly better than expected, an atmosphere of ‘guaranteed finalist’ has been building around their entries, especially given the more-than-average number of allies (even if not a big hitter as you correctly said) and their spot-on year-after-year presentations. The prospect of Ukraine being in danger at the semi level was never an issue before, although it was not in the blood-bath of the 1st semi in 2011. Just puts things in perpective! And on top of that, if someone told me 3rd and 17th in the semi, I would bet it was 3rd in the televote and 17th with the jury. Go figure! I just hate things which I cannot explain (not even in retrospective in this case!!!). Medium-sized red flag on Ukraine from now on! My biggest semi 2 bets to Q were Estonia, Lithuania & a lay on the Netherlands. Ukraine was my 4th (in terms of stake). I suppose that’s not bad enough for me to reconsider my eurovision basics hehehe, just a red flag :).
Indeed Panos. For what it’s worth, I had a small fortune on Ukraine qualifying too, as one of my ‘certainties’.
I love things that I don’t understand because they’re an opportunity to analyse and learn, and to try and understand. Here’s my explanation: it came 17th in the televote because it was lightweight, paper-thin, gaudy kitsch in the first half of a semi packed with strong ballads and serious fare, as well as a song by a non-white performer in a semi largely made up of eastern European countries (not justifying that, simply stating it). It came 3rd in the jury vote because… I dunno, they were all smoking something? After all, Malta came 5th and Georgia 8th. But seriously: perhaps because she sang the tits off it, plus Ukraine was the core ex-USSR country in this eastern-dominated semi and because there’s an element of neighbourly voting among the juries (an argument that would also explain Georgia’s result)?
I had a miniscule lay on Ukraine to qualify this year but other than that I didn’t touch it.
Potentially corrupt result that just leapt out at me: Lithuania gave Georgia douze points in the semi. In turn, Georgia gave Lithuania douze points in the final. Je smell un rat.
There’s a definite connection between Georgia and Lithuania, though Lit -> Geo seems more reliable than the other way round.
Lithuania has had nine opportunities to vote for Georgia over the years, and has awarded 8-12/10-5/12-12/12-12/12-x. Georgia in return has awarded x-0/10-x/8-x/10-12/5-12.
Notably, Lithuania’s tendency to vote for Georgia has dramatically strengthened since 50-50 was introduced.
Lithuania-Georgia is cultural-political thing which is going on since Russians invaded Georgia…
Panos, was just going to write the same re Ukraine. In the semi Gaitana was second-last in the televote and was saved by finishing 3rd with the juries. So much for voting allies!
I observe without comment that Malta’s split results since 2009 read as follows:
2009 Final: Televote 18, Jury 87
2010 Semi: Televote 40, Jury 66
2011 Semi: Televote 24, Jury 84
2012 Semi: Televote 39, Jury 97
2012 Final: Televote 10, Jury 70
A more cynical man than myself (and I’m sure such a man exists out there somewhere) might even venture to suggest that there’s a pattern emerging.
Oooooooooh!!
omg! Just which countries are they bribing?
Good lord. I think I may have found the more cynical man than myself. 😉 Besides, the flow of points between Malta and Azerbaijan (to take a random example) over the years isn’t suspicious at all in any way.
MT->AZ: x-0/x-1/x-12/10-12/x-12
AZ->MT: x-x/x-0/x-x/7-x/x-8
Just noticed the split results, some shocking things there, have to digest it properly…
Right then.
Here’s one hypothesis – overgeneral, of course – which might make some headway with a few of these apparent jury anomalies: the 2012 juries were much more interested in performance quality than song quality. Thus: Gaitana gets extra love for making a silk purse out of a sow’s ear (to quote Daniel). The Humpercodger and poor old Tooji get panned for their tragic jury dress efforts. And Jedward get roasted for putting up the same act two years running, even though the song was better the second time.
I’d also argue that this helps with Moldova v Turkey. I thought the Moldovan stagecraft was impeccable, probably the best of the contest, whereas, contra Daniel, I thought Turkey’s was tinged with desperation (which didn’t stop me gratefully taking his advice and backing it for top 10). Not much to choose between the songs themselves, by contrast.
Moving further afield, Iceland got snubbed by the juries, and it was highly professional in every way except its clunky, disconnected staging. Visually, the latent drama of the song was never realised. You could say not dissimilar things about the Netherlands and Bulgaria – unremarkable songs, but certainly good enough to hold their own if competently staged. The juries slashed through both. Denmark’s staging was also way overcooked, trying far too hard for the song, and nobody bought that. Then we have Georgia, almost the opposite: the excessive staging almost (somehow) made sense of a vile mess of a song, and the juries evidently responded.
Am I saying that juries are just becoming televoters? Not sure. The staging-over-song theory struggles with the jury love for Malta, for one, and France, for another (I must be the only person on the internet who thought that France had one of the best songs in the competition, but even if you thought the song was dreadful, the Baku staging was worse).
As for dodgy juries, yes, hmm – a few such credible theories going around now. Just another lot of data to be aware of, I suppose (particularly when considering things like who to back in the last place market – don’t think I’ll be going near Malta, no matter how appalling it is). I noticed a week or so back that Lithuania had netted a mere 5 from Georgia in the semi, yet stormed through for a douze in the final. Difficult indeed to explain if every jury vote was cast in good faith.
Daniel. Is there any way the punters can see the jury rehearsal without being in the arena? It seems a crucial part of the week and difficult for armchair punters to nail it.
Hi Sonovox, really excellent points here and I have come to some similar conclusions, which will be evident in what I post later today.
Richard, being in the press centre watching the TV feed of what the juries are seeing can’t be beaten. Things are getting better for those not at the venue though: as well as the escxtra audio feed there were a few leaks of the TV feed for certain performances of the jury rehearsal on YouTube and the like, most memorably Loreen’s snowflake moment.
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01547/anthea-turner_Augu_1547448i.jpg