More and more countries are now selecting their Eurovision entries through an internal selection. Such selections can sometimes be rather successful for countries – Duncan Laurence’s 2019 entry “Arcade” was the second winning song in a row to have been internally picked.
This year, 17 countries have selected their songs internally. That’s up two from last year.
Most prominently, four of the Big 5 nations – France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom – all ditched their national selections and switched to an internal selection process this year.
Meanwhile, other countries like Switzerland were hoping to build on the success of their previous internal selections. Last year, Luca Hänni’s “She Got Me” brought the country back to the top five at Eurovision for the first time since 1991.
Some of this year’s betting odds favourites, including Switzerland, Bulgaria and Malta were chosen through an internal selection process. Moreover, Russia’s Little Big, who have amassed more than 40 million views on the “Uno” music video, were also chosen internally.
As the 2020 contest is now cancelled, we’ll never find out whether these decisions were for the worse or for the better. However, we still want to know what you think about this year’s internally chosen entries.
Please note that while Georgia and Malta chose their act publicly, the song was chosen internally — thus allowing them to compete in our poll.
As usual, you can vote for as many options as you like, but you can only vote once! Don’t forget to voice off down below in the comments section once you’re done.
Eurovision 2020: Internally Selected Entries
Click on the song titles to remind yourself of the tracks.
- Austria: Vincent Bueno – “Alive”
- Azerbaijan: Efendi – “Cleopatra”
- Belgium: Hooverphonic – “Release Me”
- Bulgaria: VICTORIA – “Tears Getting Sober”
- Cyprus: Sandro – “Running”
- France: Tom Leeb – “Mon alliée (The Best in Me)”
- Georgia: Tornike Kipiani – “Take Me as I Am”
- Germany: Ben Dolic – “Violent Thing”
- Greece: Stefania – “Superg!rl”
- Ireland: Lesley Roy – “Story of My Life”
- Malta: Destiny – “All Of My Love”
- Netherlands: Jeangu Macrooy – “Grow”
- North Macedonia: Vasil – “You”
- Russia: Little Big – “Uno”
- Spain: Blas Cantó – “Universo”
- Switzerland: Gjon’s Tears – “Répondez-moi”
- United Kingdom: James Newman – “One Last Breath”
Poll: Which internally selected Eurovision 2020 entry is your favourite?
[crowdsignal poll=10531330]Who did you vote for? Do you think one of these entries would have taken home the Eurovision 2020 trophy? Let us know in the comments below!
Current poll results: 1. Switzerland, 2. Bulgaria, 3. Russia… yup, sound about right! 🙂
Would be good for someone to report on whether internally selected songs are more likely to win than competition won songs.
I can tell you for more recent years:
2019 – internal choice
2018 – internal choice
2017 – national final winner
2016 – national final winner
2015 – national final winner
2014 – internal choice
2013 – national final winner
2012 – national final winner
2011 – internal choice?
2010 – (kinda) national final with multiple song choices
By this statistic, I’d say the chances are roughly similar if it’s a strong song.
Gjon’s Tears and Destiny
Destiny was selected from The X Factor, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t an internal selection.
The artist was in national selection, but the song was in internal.
Unfortunately wiwibloggs readers and commentators are so predictable, they are bookies stan….. lack of personality? It’sad. One day all you will pay for all the hatred you gave and you are giving here each day, trust me. For people from certain countries wiwibloggs is becoming infrequent because of that, you get what you give in fact. You are hateful and mostly don’t let a chance to others who are not “your favorites” …. It’s so childish….. So the toxic eurofans change your way to think cause unfortunately you haven’t the absolute good taste and it’s not a handful of toxic… Read more »
Lol
Switzerland definitely
A group of us have run our own version of this year’s event on zoom. Called it #notterdam2020 We’re down to the final now on Saturday evening with juries all over Scotland ??????? Theres lots of good songs this year, what a pity they won’t get to sing on May 16th. So far Russia and Iceland have gone down well with everyone but as in real life eurovision who knows how things will go on Saturday.
Bulgaria, Azerbaijan, Switzerland and Malta
Switzerland and Bulgaria for the emotions, Ireland and Azerbaijan for the joy 🙂
Switzerland is the best song of the whole 2020 Eurovision season and I truly believe that it would win the whole thing. Only other competitor for the win in my book would have been Italy .
Same top 2, Thanos 🙂
Woah that’s great man. Let’s see if our third places are also a match. Mine is Romania!
I recently noticed that as years go by, more and more broadcasters decide to select their entries behind closed doors.
The percentage of internally selected songs, ESC 2010-2020:
2010: 12.8%
2011: 20.9%
2012: 26.2%
2013: 25.6%
2014: 27.0%
2015: 32.5%
2016: 42.9%
2017: 40.5%
2018: 30.2%
2019: 36.6%
2020: 41.5%
Will there be a year where the majority of competing entries will be internally selected?
Tibor, your hypothesis makes perfect sense. If you take away the public, you take away the joke entry but you also take away the creativity. Most delegations will play it safe (ie, jury fodder) if they are internally selecting – of course there are exceptions but for me that is a general rule.
I agree regarding the quality of internally selected songs. The songs are better on a whole and you do avoid ‘Dustin the turkey’ and ‘Gemini’ but perhaps there is a safety element and as a result fewer WOW songs. Some of the ballads this year that were internally selected are good songs but almost too mechanical.
I bet 2021 will have a lot more internally selected acts because the majority of those will be artists who didn’t get to compete this year due to the cancellation! There might be some new artists in 2021 through the national finals, but the majority will likely be the 2020 class with new songs.
Netherlands
Malta wasn’t internally selected
When did the people of Malta vote for the song?!
Yes it was
I voted for Switzerland, Malta & Bulgaria 🙂 Love those songs!
Bulgaria is top of this list for me this year – I’m just really pleased that a country has decided to tackle such a serious and difficult topic this year. And they have done it authentically and sensitively as well, so major props to them.
I don’t even know how much i wanted Switzerland to win this year. Good thing Gjon will be back in 2021