Russia saw their first ever non-qualification at the Eurovision Song Contest last Thursday, which saw the nation finishing in 15th place out of 18 in the second semi-final. Their 2018 representative, Julia Samoylova, has since spoken out since the Lisbon-hosted competition, revealing her thoughts of Russia’s results.

Since the introduction of the semi-finals in 2004, Russia has had a 100% qualification rate at the Eurovision Song Contest, together with Romania and Azerbaijan. However at the 2018 competition, everything changed.

All 3 nations failed to advance to Saturday’s Grand Final in Lisbon, sending shockwaves across the Eurovision fandom. What went wrong for the 3 successful nations?

“Everything is fair” – Samoylova

Since Russia’s non-qualification last Thursday evening, the country’s representative – Julia Samoylova – has revealed her thoughts on her nation’s results at the competition during her appearance on the Channel One talk show, Pust’ govoryat (Let them talk).

During her interview, Samoylova revealed that she does not associate her non-qualification with politics, considering her placing a fair result. Samoylova revealed:

I watched [my performance] now, because I did not specifically listen to how I sang […] I see a lot of mistakes, and it is not that I just did not pass.

Expressing her thanks and gratitude to the audience for their support throughout her performance, Samoylova added that despite that, she sees no excuse for not reaching Saturday’s final:

I think that everything is fair, I do not see anything political, and there were many strong vocalists who did not qualify to the finals.

On the night of the second semi-final, Russia received a total of 65 points with their song entry I won’t break, finishing in 15th place and therefore failing to reach the final of the competition.