“Indeed, western European participants have to decide whether they want to take part from here on in because their prospects are poor.” said Sir Terry Wogan last night during his commentary for the 53rd Eurovision Song Contest in Belgrade.
Sir Terry, who has commentated on the competition since the 1970s for the United Kingdom, said: "Russia were going to be the political winners from the beginning."
Terry Wogan Interview on Youtube click here
esctoday.com decided to take a closer look at this viewpoint. We decided toseparate all of the "western european" countries'votes aslabelled by the list of western european countries by the United Nations found here. We also decided toseparate all of the "eastern european" countries'votes aslabelled by the list of eastern european countries by the United Nations found here. We applied this situation to the Grand Final.
NOTE: Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia are notfeatured or "labelled" on either of these lists, therefore these countries' casting votes were removed for the sake of argument and fairness. Also, by coincidence, there are exactly 20 "western european countries" and 20 "eastern european countries" featured on each list which participate in the Eurovision Song Contest.
Please note: as eurovision.tv does, weDO take into account the tie-break rule for positions other than thewinning. The use of this rule is disputed but generally does not affect the results too much.
The "Western Vote" Result Table:
- Greece -96 points
- Armenia-93 points
- Norway-92 points
- Ukraine-84 points
- Russia-83 points
- Turkey-68 points
- Iceland- 62 points
- Portugal- 62 points
- Serbia- 60 points
- Latvia- 54 points
- Bosnia & Herzegovina- 51 points
- Spain- 50 points
- Denmark-44 points
- Israel- 42 points
- Sweden – 38 points
- Romania – 33 points
- France-25 points
- Azerbaijan-23 points
- Finland- 22 points
- Albania – 21 points
- Georgia-19 points
- Poland – 14 points
- United Kingdom – 14 points
- Croatia -8 points
- Germany – 2 points
Notice on the "western vote" that eventual winners Russia, would have finished 5th, Greece would have come 1st as opposed to 3rd, Armenia would havecame 2nd from 4th, Norwaywould have came 3rd but finished 5th overall, Ukraine would have came 4th but came 2nd overall.But the points differnce between the top 5 countries is close. Germany would have finished last as opposed to the United Kingdom overall.
Now the "Eastern Vote" Result Table:
1. Russia – 161 points
2. Ukraine – 121 points
3. Greece – 104 points
4. Azerbaijan – 102 points
5. Serbia – 95 points
6. Armenia – 94 points
7. Norway – 73 points
8. Israel – 66 points
9. Bosnia & Herzegovina – 56 points
10. Turkey – 52 points
11. Georgia – 50 points
12. Albania – 33 points
13. Croatia – 33 points
14. Latvia – 27 points
15. France – 18 points
16. Denmark – 16 points
17. Finland – 13 points
18. Romania – 12 points
18. Germany – 12 points
20. Sweden – 9 points
21. Portugal – 7 points
22. Spain – 4 points
23. Iceland – 2 points
24. Poland – 0 points
24. United Kingdom – 0 points
Russia finished 1st as in the overall final result. 2nd Ukraine as in the overall final result also. 3rd Greece as in the overall final result, 4th is Azerbaijan who finished 8th overall, 5th is Serbia who finished 6th overall. Poland and United Kingdom shared joint bottom according to the "Eastern vote" which Poland finished 2nd last and United Kingdom came bottom in the overall final result.
THE 12 POINTS
We decided to find which country polled the most 12 points scores (ie. countries who scored 12 points on more than one occasion.)
Fromthe "western vote alone", the top 12 points scorers were:
1. Armenia (4), coming from France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Greece.
1.Greece (4), coming from United Kingdom, Germany, Cyprus and San Marino.
2. Denmark (2), coming from Iceland and Norway.
2. Norway (2), coming from Sweden and Finland.
Fromthe "easternvote alone", the top 12 points scorers were:
1. Russia (5), coming from Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine and Belarus.
2. Serbia (3), coming from Montenegro, Slovenia and Bosnia & Herzegovina.
2. Armenia (3), coming from Poland, Russia and Czech Republic.
3. Bosnia & Herzegovina (2), coming from Croatia and Serbia.
3. Azerbaijan (2), coming from Turkey and FYR Macedonia.
3. Greece (2), coming from Romania and Albania.
