General Eurovision Discussion (2017)

Well  Russia is guaranteed to do well no matter what. Remember how mediocre Shine was in 2014 and it still managed to come 7th? And the Tolmachevy Sisters weren't even in wheelchairs.

And yes I know being in a wheelchair isn't going to change anything, since Poland still did badly in 2015, but it actually came 15th in the televote in the final, and it couldn't have been because they thought the song was any good, so if you factor in sympathy votes PLUS the neighbour votes Russia is bound to get, Fame Is Burning is definitely finishing in the top 10.

And I actually find Portugal's song to be quite pleasant, to be honest. Yes, it's a ballad, but it's different from several of the others this year. I could actually see it doing kinda well if it's staged properly. I don't think many people expected Calm After the Storm to do as well as it did, but the staging was nothing short of brilliant and it was memorable for how low-key it was compared to most Eurovision songs, similar to Belgium in 2010 as well.

The only problem is that it's Portugal lol. Their total unwillingness to sing significantly in English, plus having no real reliable voting partners could make it difficult to qualify. They're lucky they have Spain voting in their semi-final

Most Eurovision fans have synonymised the Portuguese entry with being boring and they believe that this is the reason why they won't be qualifying. In my opinion it's qualifying to the final with flying colours because:

1) It's the only song in the semi sung in a language other than English (which will give them brownie points from some)
2) It's the only 'old fashioned' and vintage song that will probably have the greatest appeal to the older demographic of any song in the semi, and this distinguishes itself from other ballads in the semi
3) Most jury members are relatively old in age and we know that most ballads go down pretty well with juries, plus the fact that with the new voting system a lack of televoting support doesn't cancel out jury votes and if you look at Israel from last year, they scored Top 5 in the jury vote and bottom 5 in the televote yet still qualified rather comfortably. Plus Spain is voting in the semi and will probably give them the most points.

Ballads like Slovenia and the Czech Republic are drawing dead already and there are a couple of ballads that are the same archetype and therefore 'cancel' each other out, so all Portugal really needs to do is make sure it isn't screwed over in the running order since most of the ballads are in the first half and they should be qualifying

Well now probably not anymore. xDD

Ukraine has rejected it thank god