When are Ireland on? How do I vote? Everything you need to know about tonight's Eurovision final
Photo/martin Tonight Tenth Thug Meissner Bambie Perform Will Ap
For the first time since 2018, Ireland will feature in the final of the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday.
Here’s everything you need to know ahead of the event.
The final of the Eurovision takes place at 8pm Irish time at the Malmö Arena in Malmö, Sweden.
Sweden is hosting this year’s competition having won it in 2023 (and equalling Ireland’s record total of seven wins in doing so).
The two semi-finals of this year’s contest took place on Tuesday on Thursday of this week.
In the first, Macroom’s Bambie Thug wowed audiences and qualified for Saturday’s final.
The final consists of 25 acts in total.
Aside from Bambie Thug, the acts from Serbia, Portugal Slovenia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Finland, Cyprus, Croatia and Luxembourg qualified from the first semi-final.
From the second, Latvia, Austria, the Netherlands, Israel, Greece, Estonia, Switzerland, Georgia, and Armenia moved on.
The UK, Germany, France, Spain, Italy automatically qualify for the final, given they are the biggest donors to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), which organises the contest. Sweden, as hosts, also automatically qualify.
It is hard to say exactly, but the official running order had Bambie Thug performing tenth on the night.
However, since that was issued, it has been confirmed that the Netherlands will not compete in the final due to an ongoing investigation by police into a complaint of inappropriate behaviour.
The final will now proceed with 25 participants instead of 26, so we can presume Bambie Thug will now perform 9th.
Here’s the order:
- Sweden
- Ukraine
- Germany
- Luxembourg
- Israel
- Lithuania
- Spain
- Estonia
- Ireland
- Latvia
- Greece
- United Kingdom
- Norway
- Italy
- Serbia
- Finland
- Portugal
- Armenia
- Cyprus
- Switzerland
- Slovenia
- Croatia
- Georgia
- France
- Austria
Keep an eye on number 10 too: the Latvian song was co-written by Mayo man Liam Geddes.
According to most bookmakers, Croatia, and their song Rim Tim Tagi Dim performed by artist Baby Lasagna, are favourites with odds of around 5/6.
At the time of writing, Israel is second favourite with odds of 16/5, closely followed by Switzerland at 5/1.
Different bookmakers have various combinations of France, Ukraine, and Ireland as having 4th, 5th, and 6th best odds to win.
At present, Bambie Thug’s odd are hovering between 11/1 and 16/1 or so.
Audience votes make up half of the result. The other half is made up of the votes from juries of five music professionals in each participating country.
The juries rank each song based on four criteria:
- composition and originality of the song
- quality of the performance on stage
- vocal capacity of the performer
- And overall impression of the act
The ranks allocated to the individual songs by each juror are then converted into a specific score value from 12 downwards decreasing exponentially; and the sum of all score values within a national jury determines the final national jury ranking for their nation.
The Top 10 songs with the highest ranks are awarded 1 – 8, 10, and 12 points.
Non-participating countries from around the world are also be able to vote, with their votes collectively accounting for the weight of one additional country.
And viewers outside participating countries can also vote in the 24 hours leading up to the final.
Viewers in participating and non-participating countries alike can vote using the official Eurovision App or at www.esc.vote – both provide the correct voting method for all eligible countries automatically.
Votes can also be cast by phone and SMS.
Per the rules of the competition, the jurors identities are not publicised until after the final. That said, spokesperson for the Irish jury is Paul Harrington, who won the contest for Ireland with the song Rock ‘n’ Roll Kids in 1994.
The 2023 Eurovision final attracted some 162m viewers from all around the world. It will be interesting to see if this year’s competition surpasses this mark.
And the participation of Israel in this year’s competition has caused some controversy, with pro-Palestinian protests taking place in Malmö in recent days.
At a dress rehearsal on Wednesday, Israeli artist Eden Golan was met with boos and shouts of “Free Palestine” from some members of the audience.
This was followed up in their performance on Thursday evening, with audible boos inside the arena.
Israel originally submitted a ballad called October Rain for this year’s contest, widely thought to reference the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023. However, the entry was barred on the grounds of breaking rules on political neutrality.
Israel’s public broadcaster Kan, responsible for choosing the country’s entry, later agreed to amend the song following the Israeli president Isaac Herzog’s call for “necessary adjustments” to ensure it could take part. Some of the song’s lyrics of the song were subsequently changed.
For its part, the EBU continues to hold the position that the contest remains a non-political event that unites audiences around the world through music.