58 Points

We ran several predictive articles as of late. It is time to keep ourselves honest. *sadtrombone*

The top 5 from each of the juries and televotes are guaranteed finalists

Our cheap-and-cheerful method to predict qualifiers from the semi-finals to guess surmise the entries likely to be in the top five of either the jury or the public (both is good too, like obvs.).

Here’s the top five from Semi-Final One:

Televoting		Jury
Country	Points	Country	Points
Ukraine	164	Malta	174
Malta	151	Russia	117
Lithuania	137	Ukraine	103
Russia	108	Israel	99
Israel	93	Cyprus	92

Indeed, all of these entries qualified: but there’s only six of them, since Malta, Ukraine, Russia and Israel were all on both lists. So how did the other four who qualified do with juries versus televoters?

Sweden qualified 7^th overall (142 points) having been ranked 6^th by the juries and 10^th by the public. Azerbaijan qualified 8^th overall (138 points) having been ranked 6^th by the public and only 11^th by the juries. Belgium qualified 9^th (117 points) having been ranked 7^th by the juries and only 11^th by the public. Norway grabbed the last slot (110 points) having been ranked 8^th by the public and 12^th by the juries.

Croatia missed qualifying by 5 points-despite being 9^th with the public and 10^th with juries. Because it is a points game rather than an ordinal ranking one. Still, it must sting in Zagreb.

Here’s the top five from Semi-Final Two:

Televoting		Jury
Country	Points	Country	Points
Finland	150	Switzerland	156
Iceland	148	Bulgaria	149
Switzerland	135	Iceland	140
Moldova	123	Portugal	128
Portugal	111	Greece	104

There was less agreement here: only Switzerland, Iceland and Portugal featured in both top five lists, but all seven entries above did qualify.

As well, Serbia qualified in 8^th place overall (124 points) having been ranked 9^th in both the public and jury tallies. San Marino were 9^th overall (118 points) having been ranked 7^th with the juries and 10^th with the public. Albania grabbed the last slot (112 points) having been ranked 8^th by the juries and 11^th by the public. Denmark missed qualifying in 11^th place overall, but by a rather large 23 points.

Overall, the method works…but it’s still too coarse. So next year we will try to ascertain the likely top six and see if that works a bit better.

Momentum coming out of the Semi-finals

We had identified Malta, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Norway, Cyprus and Lithuania and Russia from iTunes, and Russia, Ukraine, Cyprus, and Azerbaijan from YouTube.

Ukraine, Malta, Lithuania, Russia all finished top 10. Cyprus were 16^th, Norway 18^th and Azerbaijan 20^th.

Meh.

Discerning the top Semi-Finalists from their Grand Final draw performance order

The top three from each semi-final were Switzerland (1^st SF1), Iceland (2^nd SF1), Bulgaria (3^rd SF1), Malta (1^st SF2), Ukraine (2^nd SF2), and Russia (3^rd SF2):

Country	SF rank	Slot	Previous SF Winner Slot?
Switzerland	1	11	Yes
Iceland	2	12	Yes
Bulgaria	3	17	No
Malta	1	6	No
Ukraine	2	19	No
Russia	3	5	No

So performing number 11 in the running order has again been given to a semi-final winner (Switzerland), but the other one semi-final winner (Malta) were given slot six. Ukraine was the only semi-final “medal winner” to get a second half draw.

It is perhaps time we stop using at this as a reliable indicator of semi-final victory.

Coming up

New results means lots of data. So much data. Sheets of it in our mother of all spreadsheets. A Some of the thing we will analyse in the coming weeks:

1. A deep dive in the Grand Final results, overall and with juries versus the televote
2. Drilling down into each semi-final’s data
3. Looking at momentum
4. Consider the question of the pre-qualified finalists
5. Pots and blocs and stuff
6. Possibly something about potential social or political impacts on scoring

These might be more than six articles. We will write where the data lead us.