Eurovision is back and this year it is being held in Malmö, Sweden following Loreen's victory in Liverpool (the UK hosted in 2023 for Ukraine).

37 countries are participating in the 68th Eurovision Song Contest, with 26 making it through to the Grand Final on May 11th - the "Big Five" (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and United Kingdom), last year's winner (Sweden), the 10 best from Semi-Final 1, and the 10 best from Semi-Final 2.

Today we had the first semi-final where 15 countries, determined by draw, were whittled down to 10. There were also performances by the United Kingdom, Germany, and Sweden who prequalified for the Grand Final. 

We decided to play along and used the scorecard from Mission Eurovision which has four criteria to judge (each scored out of 10):
  • BOP-ABILITY: How much of a bop, a banger, a CHOON the song is! Makes you wanna (dirty) dance!
  • GIVES ME ALL THE FEELS: Does it make you all warm and fuzzy inside? Does it make you delirious with joy? Does it make your heart ache – and not just because you ate ALL the sausage rolls?
  • OUTFITS BE SNATCHED: Category is: FIERCE! Dressed to impress, and not a nip-slip in sight.
  • FLAWLESS PERFORMANCE: On a scale of Jemini to Conchita, how much did they NAIL IT?
We then worked out our ranking from our scores:

SEMI-FINAL 1

ARTIST

SONG

OUR RANKING

QUALIFIED

🇨🇾

Cyprus

Silia Kapsis

Liar

1


🇭🇷

Croatia

Baby Lasagna

Rim Tim Tagi Dim

1


🇱🇹

Lithuania

Silvester Belt

Luktelk

3


🇮🇸

Iceland

Hera Björk

Scared of Heights

3


🇫🇮

Finland

Windows95man

No Rules!

3


🇺🇦

Ukraine

alyona alyona and Jerry Heil

Teresa & Marie

6


🇦🇺

Australia

Electric Fields

One Milkali (One Blood)

6


🇵🇹

Portugal

Iolanda

Grito

8


🇵🇱

Poland

Luna

The Tower

9


🇲🇩

Moldova

Natalia Barbu

In the Middle

9


🇱🇺

Luxembourg

Tali

Fighter

11


🇷🇸

Serbia

Teya Dora

Ramonda

12


🇸🇮

Slovenia

Raiven

Veronika

12


🇦🇿

Azerbaijan

Fahree feat. Ilkin Dovlatov

Özünlə Apar

14


🇮🇪

Ireland

Bambie Thug

Doomsday Blue

15



Our favourites from the first semi-final are Cyprus and Croatia.

Unfortunately Australia, Azerbaijan, Iceland, Moldova, and Poland all failed to make it through to the Grand Final.