Sweden’s Second Chance round — known for a series of duels that eventually lead some acts to the Melodifestivalen final — is being axed. Aftonbladet has confirmed that the Andra Chansen round will be replaced by another heat — Semi-Final 5.
The overall number of competing acts — 28 — will remain the same. During the first four semi-finals, two acts will advance direct to the final as normal, while two other acts will advance to the fifth semi-final. The eight acts in Semi-Final 5 will then be divided into two groups. The two songs that receive the most votes in each group will advance to the grand final of Melodifestivalen 2022.
The Swedish newspaper reports that the “duel” format of Andra Chansen, which has been around since 2004, is widely disliked by artists and the record labels behind them.
Melodifestivalen 2022: Andra Chansen will be replaced by Semi-Final 5
Asked by Aftonbladet about the situation, Anette Brattström confirmed that Andra Chansen is getting the chop.
“That’s right. Every year we like to review the format and make as exciting an experience as possible for our viewers and followers in the app. We thought that the Second Chance round and the format with duels needed to be reviewed. An escalation before a final is a semi-final so it was quite a given that that was what we were going to do.”
“The purpose of the Second Chance from the beginning was that the artist would have the opportunity to redo their performance from the competition if you felt that there was something to do differently.”
“But today almost everything is rehearsed to perfection, so no major changes are made. Almost no one wants to make changes so the idea of Second Chance fails.”
On social media, a lot of folks have been asking what the point of this is. After all, is it really such a huge shake-up if artists are (1) still getting a second chance and (2) still being eliminated in groups? It almost seems like the two-person duel has simply become a four-person duel.
You could argue that getting rid of the duels eliminates the sting of losing to one singular artist. At the same time, it may eliminate the strategy of “voting against” someone instead of four them. @ge_aldrig_upp wrote this on Twitter:
I wholeheartedly enjoy this change. Duels tended to favor the "vote against" factor (e.g. Anton Hagman vs Loreen, 2017) and often ended up being super predictable, which kinda undermined their purpose. This should make for a more exciting 2nd chance show.
— Davide Maistrello (@ge_aldrig_upp) October 17, 2021
Writing in our Insta comments, a user named dangerbae suggested it’ll make for less interference from producers. They wrote: “It’s andra chansen without the heavy-handed deck stacking from production by setting up the duels. We do, in fact, love to see it.”
The andra chansen system involved pairing acts to compete in duels. The pairs were never taken from the same semi-final and were sometimes matched as acts of the same genre.
Some viewers were critical of the andra chansen duels, as some of the pairings took place between two of the strongest acts, meaning that one act would have to be eliminated regardless.
In the andra chansen round of Melodifestivalen 2017, Eurovision champion Loreen duelled against teen favourite Anton Hagman. Both artists had their different supportive fanbases. Hagman narrowly won the duel, meaning Loreen did not make it to the Melodifestivalen grand final. Under the new system, both acts could end up in the Melfest grand final.
Melodifestivalen 2022 dates
- Semi-Final 1: Malmö – Malmö Arena (February 5)
- Semi-Final 2: Gothenburg – Scandinavium (Feburary 12)
- Semi-Final 3: Linköping – Saab Arena (February 19)
- Semi-Final 4: Lidköping – Sparbanken Arena (February 26)
- Semi-Final 5: Örnsköldsvik – Hägglunds Arena (March 5)
- Final: Stockholm – Friends Arena (March 12)
What do you think? Is ditching the andra chansen round a good idea? Is the new format fairer on contestants? Tell us your thoughts below!
Only if they draw those two groups randomly. Well, it is not going to happen, right? I would prefer another 1st to 8th ranking with the top 4 qualifying instead of two groups. Like, come on.
I do like the idea. I’ve never been a fan of the duels, so getting rid of them sounds fine to me. Some good acts will have now an opprtunity, before they were out if they had to duel against a favourite. The idea of a duel it is also too competitive for me, because there’s a public winner, but also a public loser. That may be taken by some contestants as some kind of humiliation. It is better when you just don’t advance to the next round. Do you know what I mean? I’m not a huge fan of… Read more »
I honestly wish instead of doing the same sort of format (with artists from a previous semi getting a second chance in semi 5), that they would have just accepted more songs and had a grand final increased by two additional acts. Or, and this might come across as unnecessary because the idea will be spread out across the other four semi-finals, but why not have the fifth semi be comprised of entirely newcomers so that the grand final will be guaranteed to have at least two new acts. Something similar to what Sanremo is about to do with its… Read more »
Well technically if in 2021 Eva & Ewa were placed in a 4 song group with Clara, Klara and Efraim Leo who made up Duels 3 & 4 they probably would still be eliminated based on the age group points distribution. E&E only won 3 age groups, Clara won 5 and Klara won 8.
Eurovision historians , please tell me, has anyone from Andra Chansen ever actually come close to making Eurovision itself? Surely if they couldn’t qualify for finals they weren’t going to qualify anyway? I don’t know melodifestivalen history enough to know if there’s really much point to the second chance? Thank you!
Clara Klingenström came fifth this year, qualifying from Andra Chansen
Felix Sandman with Every Single day came second in 2018
Robin Stjernberg won Melodifestivalen 2013 after qualifying from Andra Chansen
Interesting! Thanks!
This just gets rid of the suspicion about bias in the duel match making process. No longer can people claim their favs didn’t make the final because they got an unfavorable match.
The only rule that should be relevant is to get rid of pre-recorded voices.
Oh wait, why select an act that now will need zero changes for Eurovision ….
I still wonder why these duels came around in 2004. If it’s a fifth semifinal, then do it as a whole and rank the songs from 1st to 8th and qualify the top 4, no ?!
Ha! This makes too much sense. Is too simple and easily understood.
Deltävling is a compound word of “del” (part) and “tävling” (competition/race). It’s a competition within the competition. Winning a deltävling will never mean you are certain to win the whole competition. A semifinal in Swedish means the winner will go to the final. It’s more sparsely used and by word means the stakes are higher. So a deltävling will be “just” a show, while semifinalen will be the last and final round before the finals. Is it only semantics? Yes. Should they have let all 8 compete in a single round? Sure. But… we must remember it’s the same songs… Read more »
The reason they are put into 2 groups is to maintain control of culling the ‘bad’ acts. If they make it so the top 4 go through, it could affect favourited acts in the final. Also, it would reduce variety in the acts. Lipstick on a pig basically. Personally I would rather them get rid of andra chansen and just reward the top 3 acts of each semi final. Have that 5th week being a behind the scenes (interview montage they usually show of each artist and such) aspect to understand the act and the importance of why they’re in.… Read more »
The small change is positive (and I would like if Norway also gets rid of the one-on-one duels) but yeah, SF5 it’s… still andra chansen. What caught my attention is Brattström’s quote. If we don’t see any improvement on those entries because the whole package is already too tightly produced, AC will only make a difference in the rare case of 3 popular entries being performed in the same semi. It’s almost like a safety net to the producers.
Same trash, different name. They should change the Melodifestivalen name to Recyclefestivalen! Haha!
I have decided I am going to stop drinking water. Instead, I am going to start drinking a new beverage that is 2 parts hydrogen, 1 part oxygen. and calling it Dihydrogen monoxide.
BAHAHAHAHAHA
This comment!
they had us in the first half, not gonna lie
As the author states, it still is Andra Chansen, just the duels are now between 4 instead of 2 and they changed the name.
It is all semantics. The Swedish term deltävling doesn not mean semi final as such, its literally means part of the contest. A heat would be more correct and andra chansen would be the semi final. So now it has the correct term..
Instead of just having a Semi 5 with brand new 7 songs, lets do a replay of the same old. And fans will be happy. Deluded fans.
did you even read the article
Actually the 4 first weeks are quarter finals and not semifinals, has always been, second chance is going to be semifinal therefore they divide the the qualifiers into 2 groups for the sake of justify that it is actually a Semifinal.
If MGP 2022 is still using duels, I think the only way they will vanish is if Norway fails to qualify at Eurovision.
Yes its the duel format mid way through that really determines if Norway has a good song or not.
So many changes to NF are superficial, either you have a song capable of doing well at Euriovision or you don’t how you go about eliminating all the other songs doesnt effect that.
Sweden you can change the name, you can change the way to select the finalists in this round but it’s still Andra Chansen, it’s not a semi-final like the others.
Interesting… Second chance round was unfair, specially when producers pair together two good songs. That said, It’s basically the same but 4 acts instead of two. Still, Andra Chansen is important. Imagine, Felix Sandman went from Andra chansen to 2nd in GF in 2018
It’s still a Second Chance, why did they change its name though?! It makes no sense. Andra Chansen is iconic
I don’t get why they’re being divided into 2 groups? Why not just have the top 4 out of the 8 acts qualify…
It’s still an Andra Chansen.
It’s hard to translate deltävling, but the correct translation for former andra chansen would be semi final while the others should be considered as ”heats” or something like that rather than all of them being semi final 1-5. If I assume SVTs intention based on Aftonbladets article, there would be 4 heats as usual, one semi final and one final.
Exciting with something new, i hope it plays out well
Not Swedish myself but doesn’t andra chansen literally translate to andra (extra/second) chansen (chance) ?
Yes but deltävling does not mean semi final. Andra Chansen is the only proper semi final and now that what it will be known as.
I always thought that “Andra Chansen” literally means “second chance”, and therefore making it a wildcard round.
It does! I may have been inarticulate in my first post! Andra chansen is indeed translated to second chance. My point is that now when andra chansen is THE semi final, it is not correct to translate ”deltävling” to semi final, since semifinal now has a different meaning in the swedish language (in this context). Therefore, i would call it heat 1-4, the semi final and the final, rather than semi final 1-5 and the final
It’s still a duel—just happens to be among four people. Four compete and Two are eliminated. This is all semantics. I also don’t understand why not have 8 sing and the top 4 vote getters advance.
This was a good change, although I’d prefer to have another semi final with 7 more songs to choose from.
I was just wondering when wiwibloggs was going to report on the andra chansen change. Even though it’s called semi final 5, it’s still technically a second chance round that’s just bringing the third and fourth placers, but doing it as two different groups instead of duels. Why change the title if it’s still a second chance round anyway?
Perception. People always say andra chansen finalists can’t win, this is just a way of making them equal to the other finalists. Nothing has really changed.
But that was proven wrong already.
Proof is irrelevant to perception.
à la Brexit
Agree. In Swedish the distinction makes more sense. The 4 semifinals are called “deltävlingar”, more like 4 heats of a competition rather than semifinals. But now the new 2nd chance will be called in Swedish “semifinal”, which gives more the perception of the participants being the best of the best…
That makes a Little more sense on a psychological basis, but the best of the best are still directly placed in the final.
What will the fifth “semi final” be called in Swedish to distinguish it from final and deltävlingar?
Semifinal