Eurovision 2022: Final Thoughts

After months of national finals, pre-parties, rehearsals and semi-finals, we are approaching the end of an unprecedented Eurovision season with tonight’s grand final.

The presence of Ukraine at the top of the betting markets at around a 70% implied chance has been a source of confusion, frustration and opportunity for many a Eurovision trader. In any other year, Ukraine’s entry would be competing for a top 10 finish at best, but wider geopolitical circumstances have (mostly) casual traders flocking in droves to back Ukraine at increasingly shorter odds.

The unprecedented nature of the situation makes this year’s contest extremely difficult to predict. No metrics that one might use to measure the popularity of an entry, whether those be statistical or just plain intuition, effectively capture the potential impact of a widespread sympathy vote for Ukraine in the televote (and among some jurors). However, I’ve decided to give it a go, outlining the top 5 contenders and my views on their prospects.

The contenders (in odds order)

Ukraine

Starting with the immovable object at the top of the market, we have Ukraine. This is the most difficult favourite to predict in recent memory, with so many question marks about how they might do on both sides of the vote.

In my final forecast, I have Ukraine topping the televote with somewhere in the region of 300 points (50% chance of a 265–345 range), over 100 points ahead of their nearest rival. This three-figure lead sounds like a lot, but it’s not insurmountable given the likely jury deficit Kalush Orchestra will face. Ukraine follows a very strong trio of Italy, Spain and Netherlands in the running order, and watching last night’s jury show, they stood out among the four as a clear drop in quality based on the metrics jurors are supposed to look out for. A fair jury result for a song like this would be mid-table at best, but I suspect some sympathetic jury members will push this up the rankings a bit.

Looking at the borderline qualifiers who made it through in the semi-finals (Switzerland, Iceland, Azerbaijan and Belgium), we can see that these are all traditionally ‘jury-friendly’ entries, suggesting the jurors are quite seriously-minded this year and don’t have a lot of time for funner entries (San Marino, Ireland, Austria, Latvia and Albania were all eliminated). In my view, this doesn’t bode particularly well for Ukraine with the jury vote tonight. I have Ukraine 8th in my jury forecast, but the range of outcomes is larger than my model would assume given the unique circumstances.

Ukraine can win tonight, but as a trader you have to play the percentages to find the best value, so laying this at 1.4 still looks like a good bet.

Points targets for the win: Televote 360 + Jury 145

Sweden

Cornelia Jakobs’ ‘Hold Me Closer’ is one of the two entries I had down as the clearest challengers to Ukraine throughout the entire Eurovision season (the other being Italy). With rehearsals plagued by technical difficulties and Cornelia looking quite low energy at times, there was a period where I thought Sweden might end up out of contention. Most of these issues have been ironed out and she gave it her all in last night’s jury show, belting out a jury-friendly delivery of ‘just give me the night’ in the final chorus that we haven’t seen since her Melodifestivalen winner’s performance and various pre-parties. This may have been the moment that won her the jury vote and pipped the UK to the post.

I’ve always maintained that Sweden would probably need a second half draw to be in with a shot given the song’s less televote-friendly nature, but with a draw of 20, ‘Hold Me Closer’ will be remembered. Based on metrics like the My Eurovision Scoreboard app (even accounting for its pro-female singer bias), the 200,000-strong EurovisionWorld.com poll and various streaming platforms, the song is more than holding its own. I expect a Ukraine/Spain top two in the televote, but Sweden is one of a few countries with a shot at third.

If I had to pick a winner, it would be Sweden, based on its likely strength with both sides of the vote. In my view, it’s the best song of the year and would make a worthy winner. As I’m writing this, Sweden has overtaken the UK in the odds with most bookmakers and sits in second, probably thanks to some of the early-rising analysts publishing their preview articles this morning. Alongside some good outright odds over the last few months, I managed to get Sweden at around 8/1 last week with a traditional bookmaker featuring very friendly each-way terms (1/4 of the odds for 4 places, which means I effectively got 2/1 on the place part of the bet when it ought to have been odds on). If you can still find this kind of price, an each way bet on those terms is very good value.

Points targets for the win: Televote 220 + Jury 285

United Kingdom

For the first time in over a decade, the UK is a contender to win Eurovision.

Despite the UK’s dire televote results in recent years, having few traditional televote allies matters less at Eurovision the further you go up the scoreboard, with many winning songs over the last decade coming from countries with historically little support (Austria 2014, Portugal 2017, Israel 2018, Netherlands 2019). However, the further down the scoreboard you get, the more allies matter.

Looking at various stats and taking into account the Ukraine situation, the UK is in the 3rd–5th chasing pack in the televote (even before applying country-to-country biases), rather than the top two like the aforementioned winners. This is likely to mean the UK drops a few televote points here and there, which could be important in a potentially close race.

The UK will be hoping that their strong performance in the Euro Jury this year translates to a jury win, but it’s worth flagging here that the UK tends to over-perform with the Euro Jury, and I have some concerns about Sam doing slightly too much in the performance to turn off jurors. The introduction of the obviously-mimed guitar solo may cheapen the overall package for them slightly, even if it makes the entry more memorable with the televote. Those two things might just cancel each other out, points-wise.

The UK will end up with our best result for over a decade, but if you’re looking for a jury-friendly entry with a solid televote appeal, Sweden seems like the superior choice in my eyes.

Points targets for the win: Televote 230 + Jury 275

Italy

For a while, Italy looked like the obvious alternative to Ukraine in the betting markets with the song amassing strong streaming numbers across Europe and likely to have a big jury appeal. Given the rehearsals and the overall stage show, though, it doesn’t feel like Italy is going for the win this year.

Mahmood and Blanco have changed outfits in almost every show so far, which doesn’t point to a country that has a clear, well-executed vision of winning the contest. Furthermore, Blanco sounded quite nervous it last night’s jury show and vocally, there are stronger options available for jurors.

I imagine ‘Brividi’ will get similar scores with both the televote and jury, and the 3rd–5th range looks like the most likely outcome.

Points targets for the win: Televote 250 + Jury 255

Spain

Chanel was the star of the show last night with a rapturous reception from the crowd. ‘SloMo’ is arguably the biggest televote threat to Ukraine in a sea of slow songs this year, but I still have concerns about its jury score. As I outlined earlier, jurors seem to be quite seriously-minded this year and are taking a puritanical attitude towards sex (Albania, Latvia and San Marino were all odds-on qualifiers in the semi-finals and missed out). Of course, ‘SloMo’ is a stronger overall package than those three, but there does appear to be a pattern on display with the kinds of televote-friendly, sexual entries that seem to have been marked down by jurors this year.

Eleni Foureira’s ‘Fuego’ from 2018 is the closest direct comparison to Spain this year, and that finished fifth with the juries. I think a similar result for Spain is likely.

This isn’t a bad shout at odds of 25, especially if Ukraine’s televote score doesn’t end up as high as we all assumed it would be, but it’s not the biggest overall challenger given its jury risks.

Points targets for the win: Televote 275 + Jury 230

Recommended bets

Lay Ukraine @ 1.4

Back Sweden each way @ 8/1 (Sporting Index, 4 places at 1/4 odds)

Smaller stakes:

Back Sweden to win the jury vote @ 6.6

Back Iceland to finish last @ 14/1 (Betfair Sportsbook)

Lay Norway @ 1.88 to finish top 10

Full predictions

Will be published on Twitter later this afternoon.