In May Portugal became the first country to win both the jury vote and televoting under the new voting system that was introduced in 2016. But what happens if we take this year’s Eurovision result and apply the pre-2004 system, whereby only countries competing in the grand final vote? Would Salvador Sobral hang on to his Eurovision trophy? And how would this shake up the rest of the results?
In the three tables that follow, you can see what would have had happened if the pre-2004 system had been applied in Kyiv. These results are based on the actual points awarded by the 26 grand finalists, and differences from their actual voting results are indicated in brackets. As at Eurovision 2017, the tie-breaker rule is applied to all countries with the same total number of points — aka, the country with more televotes wins the tie.
Eurovision 2017: Alternative results
In this first table, the results are based on the combined scores between the 26 grand finalists. The top 3 remain unaffected, with Portugal finishing 83 points ahead of Bulgaria. The Netherlands jump straight into the Top 10 from 11th to 8th, while Norway falls to 12th from 10th. Having received points from semi-finalists Ireland and Switzerland, Germany would’ve ended up with their second nul points in three years.
Greece’s Demy would gain the most from the old system — moving up five places to 14th, just ahead of Belarus under the tie-breaker rule.
The biggest loser in the old system would be Croatia, who falls from 13th to 19th. Jacques Houdek may have complained about the lack of Ex-Yugoslav jury support, but he can be thankful the semi-finalists had their say.
- Portugal – 455 points (No change)
- Bulgaria – 372 points (No change)
- Moldova – 286 points (No change)
- Sweden – 224 points (Up 1 place)
- Belgium – 198 points (Down 1 place)
- Romania – 182 points (Up 1 place)
- Italy – 152 points (Down 1 place)
- The Netherlands – 116 points (Up 3 places)
- Hungary – 115 points (Down 1 place)
- Australia – 104 points (Down 1 place)
- France – 99 points (Up 1 place)
- Norway – 93 points (Down 2 places)
- Azerbaijan – 70 points (Up 1 place)
- Greece – 61 points (Up 5 places)
- Belarus – 61 points (Up 2 places)
- Austria – 61 points (No change)
- United Kingdom – 60 points (Down 2 places)
- Cyprus – 56 points (Up 3 places)
- Croatia – 54 points (Down 6 places)
- Denmark – 52 points (No change)
- Poland – 48 points (Up 1 place)
- Armenia – 37 points (Down 4 places)
- Israel – 30 points (No change)
- Ukraine – 25 points (No change)
- Spain – 5 points (Up 1 place)
- Germany – 0 points (Down 1 place)
Eurovision 2017: Alternative televoting results
Of course, only televoting existed back in 2003. Here we focus on the televote and exclude the results from all 16 eliminated semi-finalists. The top 3 remain unchanged, but Portugal wins the televote by 21 points. (That’s down from the 39-point margin Salvador had in the grand final televote this year).
Romania climbed to 4th ahead of Belgium and France finished above Croatia in the top 10.
- Portugal – 228 points (No change)
- Bulgaria – 207 points (No change)
- Moldova – 196 points (No change)
- Romania – 157 points (Up 1 place)
- Belgium – 153 points (Down 1 place)
- Italy – 95 points (No change)
- Hungary – 88 points (No change)
- Sweden – 82 points (No change)
- France – 72 points (Up 1 place)
- Croatia – 40 points (Down 1 place)
- Poland – 31 points (Up 1 place)
- Cyprus – 29 points (Up 2 places)
- Greece – 26 points (Up 3 places)
- Norway – 19 points (Up 1 place)
- The Netherlands – 15 points (Up 4 places)
- Belarus – 15 points (Down 3 places)
- Ukraine – 13 points (No change)
- Azerbaijan – 10 points (Down 7 places)
- Armenia – 9 points (Down 1 place)
- Denmark – 8 points (Up 1 place)
- Spain – 5 points (Up 2 places)
- Israel – 4 points (No change)
- United Kingdom – 4 points (Down 3 places)
- Australia – 2 points (Up 1 place)
- Austria – 0 points (Up 1 place)
- Germany – 0 points (Down 1 place)
Eurovision 2017: Alternative jury results
The juries weren’t brought back until 2009, so here are this year’s jury results based on the 26 grand finalists only. Unsurprisingly, Portugal comfortably came out on top with the top 5 unaffected. Austria and Azerbaijan both jump three places into the top 10 to finish 8th and 9th respectively, with the United Kingdom dropping out at 11th and Belgium slipping down to 14th.
- Portugal – 227 points (No change)
- Bulgaria – 165 points (No change)
- Sweden – 142 points (No change)
- Australia – 102 points (No change)
- The Netherlands – 101 points (No change)
- Moldova – 90 points (Up 2 places)
- Norway – 74 points (Down 1 place)
- Austria – 61 points (Up 3 places)
- Azerbaijan – 60 points (Up 3 places)
- Italy – 57 points (Down 3 places)
- United Kingdom – 56 points (Down 1 place)
- Belarus – 46 points (Up 4 places)
- Belgium – 45 points (Down 4 places)
- Denmark – 44 points (Down 1 place)
- Greece – 35 points (Up 3 places)
- Armenia – 28 points (Down 2 places)
- Hungary – 27 points (No change)
- Cyprus – 27 points (Up 2 places)
- France – 27 points (No change)
- Israel – 26 points (Up 1 place)
- Romania – 25 points (Down 6 places)
- Poland – 17 points (Up 1 place)
- Croatia – 14 points (Down 1 place)
- Ukraine – 12 points (No change)
- Spain – 0 points (Up 1 place)
- Germany – 0 points (Down 1 place)
Which voting system are you the biggest fan of? Let us know in the comments below!
Photo: Andres Putting (EBU)
I find that the “finalist juries only” is the most revolting result (Sweden THIRD? Australia FOURTH?!? O’G3NE 5th, Austria somehow up at 8th, Italy somehow down at TENTH?). About the only thing that isn’t revolting is Azerbaijan cracking the top ten. Conversely, I find that the “finalist televote only” is even more enjoyable than the actual result: Romania up in 4th, France 9th, and Croatia 10th, while pushing the empty “meh” of Sweden down to 8th and kicking Australia out of the top ten entirely. I’ll 2nd the request to do the 2009-2015 “merged results”. Some countries got widely split… Read more »
I agree. The televoting seemed to be a lot more reflective of the more interesting songs that the jury voting.
There are videos on YouTube for this (except for 2013, EBU never released the data from that year, I guess it’s because there was something fishy). Poland would’ve come 8th in 2014, for example!
On the contrary, televoting is always rubbish. Romania and Croatia are totally trash and gimmicky entries
As I see the voting results from 2014 to 2017 are changing. Both in 2014 and 2016 points were shared fairly, like for example 14th place in: 2014 had 63 points (a fair amount of points) 2016 – 14th place – 56 points (televoting) 80 points (jury) But in 2015 and 2017 points are more concetrated on top 10 songs, rather than other countries… still as an example 14th place. 2015 – 14th place – 39 points (overall) 2017 – 14th place – 32 points(televoting) 58 points(jury) – *kind of fair Is it just because of the songs or maybe… Read more »
In 2015 the televoting points were shared as usual (11th place got 77, 12th place got 69 etc). In 2017 there was an abiss between 10th and 11th places (90 to 42), it’s just because the public only found 10 outstanding songs to vote for and didn’t really care about the rest I guess.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgSdHN-adDY&feature=youtu.be&t=459 this guy said “Welcome to Eurovision Song Constest” at MTV Europe Music Awards 2005. Also Madonna is back to Portugal since ESC’17 started. (someone noticed this video, I’m just sharing here)
Greece won Eurocup – 2004
ESC host city/country 2005 – Kiyv Ukraine
Greece won Eurovision -2005
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Portugal won Eurocup – 2016
ESC host city/country 2017 – Kiyv Ukraine
Portugal won Eurovision -2017
MTV Europe Music Awards 2005 was in Portugal on Meo Arena, Lisbon. Meo Arena will host Eurovision 2018? (I really hope)
Biggest surprise for me was Azerbaijan failing to make the top 10.
I thought Greece too would be top 10, until I actual saw the live broadcast. It was awful … save for the half-naked swans.
The UK too should have done better, although it wasn’t the best song.
Guys, please make an article about what the results will be under pre-2016 sistem ! (I mean, all countries are voting but each country gives not separate jury&televoting points)
It was already done by another website. Portugal would have won with 417 (new all time record since Norway’s 387 in 2009).
Keep it as it is but fix the jury voting. It should be fairer and less subjective. It’s how you get used to sth sometimes. Example: the first contest I remember is in 2004. I know there were no semis until then, which is normal. Now we have over 40 countries, they can’t put them all in a huge grand final. Back then there was 100% televoting. I was fine. I thought it’s fair if people can choose their favourites songs. Then, in 2009, it changed to 50% jury 50% televoting. I got used to this system too. My opinion… Read more »
Interesting, but I don’t think you should give placing numbers to countries with no points, they are unplaced. Like a marathon runner who drops out, they haven’t registered any kind of result.
Poor Levina.
Next time they’ll send something livelier and/or a bit less generic. But by whom, and with what song?
My first chose, of course, is Madeline Juno. “No Words” wouldn’t have won, but it surely would have earned a lot more points for Germany.
I also would like to see a 60’s version and 1973 version of this 😛
Omg I did it for every year since 2004 once. The winners would’ve been the same every year, EXCEPT for 2004. Serbia and Montenegro would’ve won, followed by Greece. Ruslana would’ve been 3rd!
WOW! That means both times Ukraine won were both times there was a change in the voting system the same year… they wouldn’t have won both times!
2004, 2008, 2011, 2016 are examples of how geo-political the final is as there are more eastern countries who back their ‘friends’ up. These years are also the same years that the winner didn’t win their semi-final which many ESC fans arguably don’t like the winners as well.
You could say the same about Greece’s victory in 2005 and Serbia’s victory in 2007. Last year, Russia received televote points from ALL countries, with the minimum being 3 from the Netherlands, so they were going to win the televote either way.
For me Serbia and Montenegro was the winner in 2004! The best song!
The others just follow!
I agree. I never really got over Serbia and Montenegro not winning that year. It was so good!
You should also consider that there were barely any Eastern countries in the 2004 final, while all the ex-Yugoslavian countries (except Slovenia) plus Switzerland and Austria (massive Serbian diaspora) were finalists.
Best system. And the most fair
– Televote 100%
– Voting all countries
– Counting from 1 to 26 (not only Top 10). Diaspora effect would be weaker
just televote is not the most fair…
televote and diaspora ruined several good entries!
I prefer positions instead of points, even though points are more exciting. Only televoting isn’t fair, like only juries wasn’t fair back in the 90’s. I like the 50/50, but the jury needs to be reformulated. I think the jury should be a big group of (at least) 5 people from each country. So this year the jury would have 42 x 5 = 210 members. You can bribe 5 people from 5 countries, but not 50 people from 10 countries. The spokeperson can tell us the highest average position from their country’s jury. After that, we have the average… Read more »
I meant 5 from 1 country, sorry.
it’s already like this?
No. Currently, each country gives 12 points from the national jury.
What I explained was “one big jury” composed by all countries. So each country would present their best ranked songs, but in the end it would be an average ranking.
For example, it wouldn’t matter if Greece gave 1st place to Cyprus, but all the remaining juries ranked Cyprus 25th. Cyprus final ranking would be 26th.
UK in 23rd says it all lol
I don’t understand this because there wasn’t semi-finals in 2003 so all countries voted. In 2004 it wasn’t like only the finalists voted is it (Serbia and Montenegro would have won if this happened). But basically this is a weird comparison to make there are other ways could be compared e.g. 2009 rules and 2013 rules
Right, there were no semi-finals – but some countries didn’t qualify for the “grand final” based on their bad result from the previous year.
Hey Wiwibloggs!
I have made similar computations using the 2009 rule (where POINTS from jury and televoting are combined) and 2013 rule (where RANKINGS from jury and televoting are combined) for not only the grand final but also the semifinals. Originally I just uploaded it in the FB group of OGAE Rest of the World but since you guys come up with similar computations, I would like to share it here.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16rUYRlGrXQSeqFokhraCUGJ1sv8-dqBMzQOMjIafxF8/edit#gid=558960530