Following an internal selection process, Greece previously announced that Victor Vernicos would be the country’s Eurovision 2023 act with his song “What They Say”. However, that doesn’t mean all is said and done in the Hellenic nation. Melissa Mantzoukis, the runner-up of the internal selection, has been filing a lawsuit against Greek broadcaster ERT over concerns about how the selection was handled.
Mantzoukis had hoped to gain a temporary injunction ahead of the trial, which would have prevented ERT from undertaking any activities related to the case – i.e. anything related to Eurovision. If it was granted, the temporary injunction could have forced Greece to withdraw from Eurovision 2023.
But after a court ruling on Monday, this request was denied. The court decided the time frame was unreasonable and it would not have been able to rule on the case before Eurovision 2023 took place. Instead, the case will now be seen after the contest has taken place in May.
This will no doubt be a relief for Victor Vernicos, who is now able to move forward with his participation at Eurovision this year. The release date of his entry is not currently known. Although it was originally suggested to be on 6 March, this has reportedly been postponed due to the recent train crash in Tempi that killed at least 57 people.
Melissa Mantzoukis questions Greece’s internal selection
The original seven songs shortlisted by the Greek broadcaster for their Eurovision 2023 internal selection were whittled down to three and put through a rigorous evaluation process. Both an ERT-formed jury panel (made up of media and music professionals) and an audience committee (sampling Eurovision viewers by age range) judged all three songs. Their combined votes then decided an overall winner and this resulted in Vernicos finishing victorious.
Fellow competitor Melissa Mantzoukis requested the full results of the selection and subsequently raised questions over these. Mantzoukis was ranked first by the audience committee but last by the jury panel. Meanwhile, Vernicos was second with the audience and first with the jury.
| Act | Audience Committee | Jury Panel | Combined Vote |
| Victor Vernicos | 509 votes | 740 votes | 1249 |
| Melissa Mantzoukis | 693 votes | 440 votes | 1113 |
| Maria Maragou and Antonia Kaouri | 341 votes | 720 votes | 1061 |
Mantzoukis’s questions revolve around the audience committee and jury panel potentially using different voting methods. Additionally, it was reported that Maria Maragou and Antonia Kaouri withdrew their song from the selection at the last minute; Melissa therefore questions why this song was still included in the final vote.
Speaking on TV show Super Katerina, Melissa’s lawyer discussed the supposed results of the internal selection, claiming that Melissa’s winning public score had been majorly dragged down by the ERT committee score. As a result, they were going as far as to file a lawsuit against ERT.
ERT has not commented publicly about Mantzoukis’s claims or the law suit.
Whilst the full songs have not been published, snippets have been leaked online. Victor’s winning song “What They Say” appears to be a guitar ballad, whilst Melissa’s “Liar” serves a sassy pop banger, and Maria Maragou & Antonia Kaouri’s “Shout Out” is seemingly an uplifting throwback number.
Evangelina shares snippet of proposed Eurovision 2023 entry “PÁLI”
ERT received 106 submissions for their Eurovision 2023 internal selection. However, when the shortlisted seven were revealed, there was one big name that had not made the list – no other than Greek-American songstress Evangelia. After hitting the Greek music scene in 2020, she’s gone on to release hit after hit, duetting with the likes of Eurovision alumni Eleni Foureira and Amanda Tenfjord.
In a TikTok video addressed to her fans she revealed that, unfortunately, none of her submissions made ERT’s shortlist. This comes one year after she sent her hit single “Aphrodite” to CyBC in a bid to represent Cyprus at Eurovision 2022. Regardless, she thanked her fans for their ongoing support in her Eurovision dreams, and teased that on the bright side, she’ll be able to share the songs soon.
At the end of January, Evangelina shared the first preview of her new song, titled “PÁLI”. The song is very much in the same style of her previous hits – a big bilingual pop chorus, layered with sensual harmonies and organic production touches. In a later video, she revealed that this was one of the songs she had submitted to the Eurovision 2023 selection. Evangelina captioned the video saying “PÁLI is club approved”… but unfortunately this is one song we won’t be hearing in Euroclub this year.
What do you think? Would Evangelia or Melissa made a good representative at Eurovision? Should Greece go back to a public selection? Let us know in the comments below!
Has the song been released yet? I can’t find it anywhere.
Eurovoix reported that, but has since taken that news down. As far as I know, the release is “TBC” following a delay after the train crash.
wasnt it supposed to be released today?
Man, the drama around Greece this year is such a sh*tshow!
Poland says hi
Hopefully ERT will learn a transparency lesson otherwise they will discourage good artists from submitting songs in a manner that only the Romanian TVR is famous for.
i mean i kinda get her the results are pretty weird…
the least melissa could have gotten is around 560 (from the ert committee)
and she would have won
yall are convinced now?
anyway good luck to victor
That is not true, because Maria Kozakou, Greece’s Eurovision commentator for more than a decade and a member of the ERT jury clarified that they rated each of the 3 remaining songs individually on a scale of 4 to 12, so that they could add it to the votes of the public jury who had ranked the 7 songs, giving them 4-12 points. They could not just give 12 points to the first, 10 to the second and 8 to the third place, because that would mess up the 50,6%-49,4% percentages of the two juries.
It is a pity that the so called “dream team” has turned into the drama team and sacrificed a young woman’s career by having her spearhead a lawsuit that made no legal sense whatsoever simply to sabotage the chances of the artist who was chosen instead of her by associating him with an aura of “scandal”. No court would have approved a measure as radical as an injuction unless ERT had specifically committed to sending her and then reneged on that commitment. There was no other way to prove objective injury and of course no court is going to judge… Read more »
Official release date: Friday 10/3
The crime in Tempi isn’t unrelated of course but it was an excuse by ERT, they were waiting the courts decision on Monday in order to ensure the participation of Victor. And that’s the opinion shared among the greek fans.
What a horrible thing to say. Just because two things happened at the same time doesn’t mean one is used as an excuse to cover up the reason for the delaying the song release. What happened was a tragedy and Greece needed some time to mourn the loss lives before releasing the song.
Shame they did not choose Evangelina with her song(s) , she allready said to me last year she made it clear she wanted to go to Eurovision and made songs special for that.. I feel for her
There is always San Marino 🙂
Tbh the train crash isn’t a legitimate excuse to postpone a song release.
Probably you are not able to understand how big of a crisis Greece is going through right now. There are major protests in every Greek city, there are continuous strikes in the public segment, the people are FURIOUS about what is an extreme national tragedy that was caused by the chronical lack of responsibility of the Greek governments which led to the murders of 57 innocent people, mostly students with unfulfilled dreams. The entire country is paralyzed and nobody cares about anything else for these past 10 days. If you don’t live in Greece, you cannot understand how big of… Read more »
Nobody was murdered or assasinated. People died in a horrifc accident that should have been prevented in a long-neglected and antiquated network. Opposition sympathisers are latching on to this and milking it for all its worth to create maximum havoc ahead of the general election. We all remember of course that none of the people in the streets right now never raised a whiff of protest when more than a 100 people died horribly in a summer fire under a different government only 5 years ago. All that being said, ERT was right to postpone as a sign of respect… Read more »
are you serious? More than 50 innocent people were assassinated by the ridiculous politicians who did nothing to avert such a disaster. Eurovision is nice but there are more important things in life.
That Evangelina snippet is fire :-O
It sounds like the last year Cyprus, and we all know how that went lol It ok so-so current cluby Greek song, and that’s about it. It is generic, VERY bad (flat) live vocals would always drag that kind of a song down, so they did her a favor.
Euro-draaaamaaa
Love it! ?
Greece lost sassiness and won humbleness instead. Doesn’t sound like the worst thing that could happen.
EBU should implement national selection standardisation for all countries taking part. Allow a jury to select the ten finalists so that the quality is high and then put those ten to a public vote. No more back-door shenanigans.
Good idea on paper, but then a lot of established NFs like Sanremo, Melfest etc. would suffer
Sanremo would suffer, Melfest would benefit
I think that countries should have their own choice on what songs they want for Eurovision, but I think it’s better to have an EBU member during the voting sequence, so that everything is fair. They should evaluate what voting system they will use, so broadcasters have to stick to that instead of changing them last minute in order to make the broadcaster’s favourite win. This year it’s Poland, but believe me: it will happen many times in the future as well.
Sorry, but what a sore loser!
If she feels ERT injured her somehow, sue ERT for money damages and let Victor do his job. This injunction was a very petty move.
il kinda agree on this one
what was done was done but she was right to get really mad
so regarding a money damages im on her sides 100%
regarding the injuction im on her side 50%
And what do you call ERT’s move to sink her in the voting? She did what anyone who would be subjected to such unfair treatment from ERT would do. It’s easy to criticise…
So what? ERT has the absolute right to decide who represents Greece at Eurovision.
Back in 2004, they held a national final and a winner was selected. Then ERT changed its mind and sent Saki Rouvas with “Shake It” instead, with the national final winner becoming Saki’s background singer. ERT can do this.
If Melissa feels that ERT did something that hurt her career, let her sue for money damages. She can present her case to a judge in a few months.
I heard the snippet of Melissa’s song, and it was a boppppp. Does anybody know if she’s gonna release it?
i mean, ngl, jury placing 2 entires at 700 something and her randomly at 400 is sus af, but it’s internal selection after all, they could send my grandma if they wanted
Internal selections (and occasional national finals) in Greece have the tendency to become very messy. Lack of transparency is most often the reason and ERT has a bad reputation for manipulation and preferential treatment.
That said, I don’t expect a good result for Greece this year and a NQ is very likely based on what I’ve heard so far – it seems that the memo about ‘no juries in the semis’ got lost in ERT’s offices.
Money talks! Victor would not represent Greece if it wasn’t for his family, and that’s the harsh truth. Nepotism is rife in Athens.
But can he sing?
That is so petty.
We all (Greek fans) know that ERT’s jury (consisting of 60 years old people) is allergic to bops, plus they have a beef with the “dream team” nowdays, who was behind Melissa’s song.
Victor did nothing wrong nor sketchy, so throwing shade at him for being rich is rather low
Throwing shade at him for being rich, is it really rather low? As a Greek person I can attest that the Greek society is very much inequality and we lack a truly social state that guarantees social mobility and equality of chances for each Greek child/citizen. This selection process from the beginning was not based on meritocracy. It appears to me that the ERT is very much interested in third parties (aka singers and their labels) covering all the expenses related to the participation to Eurovision. The jury was therefore very much motivated also by the financial covering of their… Read more »
There’s no doubt that Greece lacks of a truly social state as you write, especially under our current administration. However, your impression that ERT relies on artists and labels on covering all the expenses related to the participation to Eurovision, is mistaken. They ‘ve spent approximately 400,000 € for Eurovision 2022, as they did for 2021 (source Eurovision fun). Additionally, “dream team’s” producer is a very generous eurofan who’s been sponsoring Greek participations since Sakis era. I mean if ERT wanted extra aid they could just rely on them, as per usual. There is zero indication that Victor’s team is going… Read more »
Can you prove this? You just sound desperate that the song you preferred (which probably haven’t listened to either) didn’t win
That’s overdriven. The duet was supposed to go, not him. We were just lucky enough they withdrew last minute.
Popo eiste entelos kourastikoi eseis oi syrizaioi. Eurovision einai agapi, ohi to kommounistiko manifesto. ELEOS pia, ola ta kanete politika.
And this is why we cannot have fun in Greece… You’ve actually provided the best link possible connected with the news, from the Greek Eurovisionfun site that’s translated in English. Honestly, I wish we withdrew. I don’t even care about our result this year because clearly ERT used corrupt, nepotistic manners to select our entry. The juries’ voting percentage was manipulated in the final selection round too. Downvote me if you want but here nobody is supporting ERT’s selection procedures, despite a lot of people supporting Vernicos for his passion and willingfulness to compete in the contest. I’m not mad… Read more »
I guess the Greeks and the Poles have something in common this year.
We should definitely exit together!! 😀
nobody (other than Jann’s psychofans i mean) want Poland to withdraw, we want clarity (how many televotes everyone got, how exactly jury votes went down, what’s reasoning behind sudden change in voting system, why some juries were chosen despite connections to artists competing, etc)
You already know the answers to your questions? 😉
nah, “if you’re innocent, you have nothing to hide”, they apparently have a lot to hide
San Marino too. Piqued Jacks have a lot of money behind them.
Do they? Their entry looks cheap for someone who allegedly have a lot of money
You literally have no proof that the decision was affected by corruption. Why would you believe that Melissa had to win? Other artists in the selection didn’t complain at all for the result. It’s also stupid to think that everyone likes the same music genre and just because the audience jury liked Mellisa so would the professional jury
The people’s calculated score for the FINAL THREE acts derives from and agreggate voting system scaling from 8, 10 and up to 12 points. 3 candidates, 3 scores, as it should be. On the juries’ however, the calculated aggregate voting system scaled from 4 up to 12 points!!! Maria Kozakou herself accidentally admitted it in an interview!! ERT had a much higher percentage of the votes in their hands, simply because they could basically choose whichever artist THEY wanted by tanking another one. Hemce why the 440 only points for Melissa. They didn’t use the same percentage as the public… Read more »
The public jury didn’t vote on the scale you mentioned, but they voted for 7 songs on a scale from 4 to 12 points. So it was actually FAIR and mathematically correct that the professional jury voted on the same scale, even though for just 3 songs. It’s true that having known the preference of the public for each song/contestant, as it was reported by Eurovisionfun, the professional jury could’ve attributed the points from the same scale so to manipulate the results, rather than according to the quality of each song, but the scale itself used by the professional jury… Read more »
If it’s true it was «Liar» vs «What They Say» Greece absolutely gave away a victory going for «What They Say». What a pity!
No it wouldn’t. Liar sounds generic and dated from that little snippet we heard.
Melissa should have accepted the results and focused her energies on producing a stronger entry for next year.
Liar would result to a victory? People who have listened to the entire song because they were part of the 70-member public jury have claimed that the verses of the song are extremely cheesy and overall the song is very generic and doesn’t bring anything new to the table. Furthermore, Melissa has proved through her participation in the German talent show that she doesn’t quite have the charisma and/or the moves to perform bops, she’s more destined to perform ballads. Keep in mind that the ERT jury voted after they held personal meetings with the team of each of the… Read more »
Tricky situation. I would never count out fishy and corrupt processes by our public broadcaster, especially with the current government in place, under which there has been a significant democratic backsliding for the country (but let’s not get into the politics here, it’s not the proper place for that). I really hope justice at last prevails, whatever that is (I personally and possibly all of us have no actual idea what has happened and what has not). Glad that we can actually participate!
Nothing happened. Melissa just doesn’t know how to lose and thought of following Trump’s steps of calling the procedure rigged
i mean, looks like both tbh, but even if it’s rigged, it’s internal .-. sucks to be her tbh, but that’s it
Bruh, you’re delusional if you really believe there’s no rigged procedures (the FIFA World cup was rigged too btw)
Axouuuu, to backsliding of democracy esi to vlepeis mono me afti tin kivernisi, LOL